Christmas Calendar 2012 Day 22 - Christstollen

Hannibal resting together with the stollen dough, while it is raising

Christstollen (German Christmas cake) has also always been a part of the sweet things served during Christmas time since I was a small child. However, it was first year, that I baked my very first own version of a Stollen using a German colleague family recipe. And this Autumn I actually brought my own stollen form in Germany, which included 2 different recipes on Stollen.

I have been struggling a bit with the first recipe, as the translation from German to English did NOT include a translation of the baking temperature for both conventional oven and fan oven, so in my first trial I ended up baking the Christstollen at too high temperature !!!!

Christstollen: - 1 cake

• 400 g flour
• 40 g yeast
• 125 g milk
• 200 g butter - soft
• 100 g sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt 
• 4 g Christstollen spice - optional
• 1 egg
• 100 marzipan - grated
• 250 g sultanas
• 50 g sucat
• 50 g orange peel (candied)
• 40 g rum
• 100 g almonds (without peel) - chopped
• 50 g butter - melted
• icing sugar 

1. Dissolve the yeast together with a teaspoon of the sugar in the milk. Add in the flour. The dough is having crumble structure. 
2. Raise the dough for 45 minutes.
3. Meanwhile mix the rum and sultanas together and let it rest until needed.
4. Add soft butter, egg, sugar, grated marzipan, and salt to the dough mixture. Knead it together.
5. Raise the dough again for another 45 minutes.
6. Heat the (conventional) oven to 180'C !!!!
7. Add the chopped almonds, sultanas in rum, sucat and candied orange peel to the dough. Knead everything together.
8. Grease the stollen form with butter or oil.
9. Fill in the stollen form with stollen dough.
10. Cover a baking sheet with baking paper. Turn the stollen form up side down, so the stollen dough is covered by the stollen form, when it is baked in the oven.
11. After 55 minutes baking remove the stollen form. 
12. Bake the stollen for another 20 minutes.
13. After a total baking time of 75 minutes, remove the stollen from the oven. 
14. Brush the warm Christstollen with melted butter.  
15. After the Christstollen is cooled down or before serving it sprinkled it with icing sugar.