Savory Kalacs

Since it is getting so close to Christmas, wrapping gifts, decorating and planning is underway. Hopefully you have many helpful hands during all this activity, but everyone needs to take a snack break. With all the holiday cookie and dessert baking, something savory is a tasty change of pace.

The sunburst of twisted dough (pictured above) may take a few hours to make due to the rising time, but the end result is well worth it. Sandwiched in between the 2 layers of dough is the bold flavor of Gorgonzola cheese. To compliment the flavor of the cheese is a mixture of onions, pancetta and mustard. Not ordinary-but extraordinary..as well as unique. Not only will this satisfy your taste buds, but the great presentation makes it a feast for the eyes.

This recipe hails from a blogger in New Zealand, so measurements are in grams and milliliters. Baking temperature is in Celsius. Conversion charts to cups and ounces are available through the internet.

No matter what occasion- happy hour, football watching party or just a friendly get together, this appetizer is the one thing that should be on your table. So set the sugar aside and pull out the cheese- let's get baking! My tweaks on this process can be found in the tips and notes at the end. They are helpful hints to for you to have baking success with this recipe.

Savory Kalacs
adapted from atdownunder blogger 

Ingredients/Dough
4 tbs of olive oil
a few pinches of salt
1 tsp of sour cream
200 ml of milk (room temp)
300 g flour
15g of yeast

Ingredients/Filling
1/4 cup crumbled Gorgonzola (or your cheese of choice)
1 tsp mustard
2 heaping tbs of sour cream
2 green onions/scallions, sliced thin
25g pancetta, diced
salt and pepper to taste
nutmeg to taste (optional)

Topping
1 egg yolk, whisked or lightly beaten
1 tsp sunflower seeds

Prepare a baking sheet by lining with parchment paper. Set aside. Also, dust a flat surface with flour.

Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl and sprinkle the top with yeast. Form a well in the center. Using another bowl, whisk together the milk and the sour cream. Pour the liquid into the sifted ingredients. Fold mixture together until a dough is formed. Transfer to prepared surface and knead for about 5 minutes. Shape dough into a mound and cover lightly. Let rise for 20-25 minutes.

Once first rising time is complete, punch down dough and form a well in the center. Pour 2 tablespoons of olive oil in the center and knead for about 30 seconds. Make another well and fill with the remaining amount of oil. Knead the dough for 5 minutes. Form into a round disc and cover lightly. Let rise for another 30 minutes.

As it rises, create the filling by mixing all listed ingredients together in a small bowl and set aside.

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Punch down dough and divide into 2 equal pieces. Take the parchment paper from the baking sheet and roll out one piece of the dough into a circle, about 25 cm in diameter. Using a small spatula, spread the filling over the surface the dough, leaving a 1/2 centimeter border on the edge.

Lightly dust a flat surface and roll out the second piece of dough, measuring the same size as the previous one. Place this second piece, making sure to center it, over the dough with the filling on top.

Invert a drinking glass over the center of the disc, slightly indenting the dough. Score the dough into four equal pieces (like cutting a pie) using the back of a knife. Score the four pieces into two equal segments and then score each of the two segments into three equal portions. After scoring, cut through dough with the back of a knife, following the score lines.

Take each portion of dough (there should be 24) by the outer tip and twist three times. Remove the glass and brush the surface with the egg yolk. Top the center circle of dough (as marked off with the drinking glass) with sunflower seeds.

Place in oven and bake until it has a golden hue. This should take about 20-30 minutes. Remove from oven and invert onto large platter. Remove parchment paper and invert bread again, this time onto a cooling rack. Let cool completely.

Tips and Notes:
1. Filling ingredients were combined in a blender, to make it into spreading consistency.

2. I increased the ingredient amount by half to make sure there was enough to cover the dough

3. Take care to not stretch the dough when twisting, so it will remain the same diameter and hold together.

4. After cutting with the back of the knife, re-cut with a sharp knife. The back of the knife process is to make sure the dough does not stretch when cutting.

                                      **LAST YEAR:Chocolate Custard Tart** 

Alfredo Bread

My grandmother used to always make homemade bread.  Since I only eat plain bread when making sandwiches, homemade bread seems hardly worth the effort. Yet my attitude changes when I start considering making a more flavorful loaf such as this one.

This bread does have the added flavor of Alfredo sauce, Parmesan cheese, basil and parsley.  It is perfect for an Italian dinner and a nice change from garlic bread.  As you can see from the picture above, there is lots of cheesy goodness in this loaf.  I found it hard to hold off until dinner.  As it baked, it did release an ethereal scent throughout the house.  I got very hungry and impatient for it to finish baking. In addition, letting the loaf cool was even harder.

The next time you are in the mood to make bread, you may want to try this one.  There are only 2 sessions of rising time, totaling 1 1/2 hrs.  Forming the bread is basically the same method as a jelly roll, so it comes together pretty easily. This recipe makes two 9x5 loaves.

Alfredo Bread
adapted from Fleishmanns Yeast

Ingredients
1/4 cup Alfredo sauce
2 1/4 cup milk
2 tbs softened butter
3 tbs sugar
2 packets yeast (original, not rapid rise)
5-6 cups bread flour
1 tbs dried parsley
1 tsp dried basil
2 tsp salt
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese

Fill a saucepan with the milk and place over medium heat. Let heat up to a temperature of 100-110 degrees. Remove from heat.  Stir in sugar and yeast. Set aside until the surface becomes foamy.  This should take about 5-10 minutes.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, whisk together the salt and 2 cups of flour.  Pour in the yeast mixture and add the butter.  Mix with beater blade until evenly distributed.  Continue to add the flour in 1 cup increments, mixing after each addition.  It should reach a soft dough stage once the 5th cup of flour has been blended in.

Take a medium size bowl and oil the interior and set aside.  The next step is kneading the dough.  If using a mixer with a dough hook, run your mixer on medium low speed for 4-5 minutes, adding flour a little at a time if needed. In order to do this step by hand, start by dusting a flat surface with flour. Place the dough on the surface and knead by hand for about 8-10 minutes.

Form dough into a ball and place it in prepared bowl.  Flip over to make sure surface is covered with oil.  Cover bowl lightly and set in a warm place to rise until doubled.  This should take about an hour.  During the rise time, prepare two 9x5 inch loaf pans by greasing the interior and set aside.

After the first rise is completed, remove the dough and punch down.  Place it back on the flat, floured surface and cut in half.  Put one half back in the bowl and keep the other half on the surface.  Roll out the half into a rectangle measuring 9x18.  Spread 2 tablespoons of Alfredo sauce on the surface of the rectangle.  Then sprinkle the dough with 1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese.  Follow that with a sprinkle of 1 1/2 tsp of dried parsley and then 1/2 tsp dried basil.

Starting with the short end, roll dough tightly into a cylinder, tugging the dough slightly after each turn. Pinch the end with the under lapping part of the dough and tuck in the short ends, pinching the same way.  Place the loaf seam sides down in the prepared pan.  Lightly cover this loaf and then prepare the second piece of dough the same way.  Let both loaves rise for another 30-40 minutes.  At the halfway point, preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Once the loaves have completed the rise, place in oven and bake until golden brown on top.  Bake time is about 30-40 minutes.  Loaves are done when hollow sound is made when tapping on top.  Place pans on rack to cool for about 10-15 minutes then invert on rack.  Invert again so loaves are in upright position.  Let cool completely before slicing.

Tips and Notes:

1.  Do not worry that there is not a border left when topping the dough.  My loaves did not split at the seams when baked, so the dough border is not required.

2.  Do not pack in more toppings than noted, unless you want to form this into a pull apart bread rather than swirled loaves.  Pull apart bread is an idea, but the layers will present a problem with the alfredo/cheese filling sticking to the pan.  The cheese will form a crust on the pan that will be hard to clean. 
                                     **LAST YEAR: Lemon Tartlets***