Time to Make the Stollen

I say it every year at around the same time: "Gotta make a stollen." And you know what? I never do. Until now that is. And boy am I glad I did! Stollen is a great holiday fruitcake from Germany. Nix the fruitcake jokes. It really is good.

I've wanted to make stollen for years. I spent some time in Germany in my younger days, and I still have a soft spot for Teutonic cuisine. The only problem with stollen is you really need to start it at least a couple weeks before Christmas. Once you bake it, it should rest for a little while to let its flavors meld. And I am not exactly the King of Timely Planning. Normally I'd do good to have it done for Valentine's Day.

Well, I finally got it going this year with three weeks of rest time ahead of me until The Big Day. I looked at a variety of recipes in both English and German and came up with what I think is a pretty good recipe. I did have one little mishap. Seems I added double the amount of milk at first as I should have.

Oops! Stollen batter. Christmas pancakes anyone?

Anyway, I was able to fix it with more flour and enough other ingredients to make a wonderfully flavorful dough. Of course, when I pulled it out of the oven, I had two gigantisch loaves like something out of an episode of Lucy. Ach! Oh well, the more the merrier. My final recipe makes more reasonably sized loaves.

I know you're not supposed to touch it until it rests for the requisite two weeks, but last night I was having erotic dreams about the fruitcake cooling in my kitchen. So snuck out at 3 am and had a secret slice. OMG!! So soft, so moist, so fruity. I'm just curious to see how it could possibly be better for Xmas. I'll check back to let you know!

Oh, and I added the recipe. Here it is: Dresdner Stollen Recipe.