Paska – Hello Victoria

PASKA TWO WAYS: UKRAINIAN EASTER BREAD

acthiessen — Sat, 15 Apr 2017 23:28:00 +0000

Are you lucky enough to find yourself with an excess of lemons and oranges this Easter? Looking for something to make with them all? This was the bounty that I had the other weekend, and I was quite keen to use them all.

The other day I posted about the more unique take on Paska that I made this past weekend, and I promised more. I decided to try making a regular paska recipe that my aunt gave me, as well as using a challah bread recipe to make a paska-flavored challah. I had remembered paska dough as being quite wet and wanted something I could braid into shapes. However, after making my Aunt’s paska recipe, I realized it wasn’t as wet as I thought. I could have easily braided it into wreaths etc.

But you want to know what this huge amount of paska means, besides being something Richard can take to work? Paska French toast!! Awesome Easter breakfast… if I do say so myself.

So my reasoning behind wanting to make paska challah bread, was that I wanted a more decorative Easter bread. As much as I like the simple icing with sprinkles, as far as nostalgia goes, it doesn’t really say “Easter centerpiece”. I decided to make both the regular recipe (in unique tins) and the challah recipe. Perhaps these will inspire you to make a showpiece bread of your own?

What I found after making both recipes, was that the paska was a bit on the dry side compared to the challah bread, but sweeter. Maybe I used too much flour in the original paska recipe, but I think that the use of oil as opposed to butter was the main factor. As controversial as it may be, I think in the future I may make the challah recipe instead of traditional paska, but increase the sugar. I did the math and the original paska recipe had about 9% sugar, while the challah was only 6%. So if you feel like trying the challah one, I have included another sugar amount, that should hopefully give you the same sugar level.

Paska Challah Bread:

Okay, so first up, we have the challah bread. I had made this recipe before and knew that it would make amazing French toast. This bread is moist, and subtly sweet… perfect to turn into paska! I made a double batch, in order to create two different shapes – a braided crown, and a five-strand braid.

If you don’t already know how a five-strand braid is actually quite simple. You can see it in the photos below, but I will try to explain. Number the strands left to right, 1 through 5. Cross 5 over 2, 1 over 3, then 2 over 1. And repeat! Make sense?

At the end of the braid, simply pinch the ends together and tuck it under. Unfortunately, my baking sheet wasn’t quite long enough to fit the bread. It caused it to flop over a bit while proving and ended up looking less than perfect.

For the braided crown, it’s a simple 3 strand braid, which I won’t bother explaining here. Just finish the braid, and connect the ends together! Luckily, this one fit my sheet, so there were no problems proving.

Traditional Paska Bread

Ingredients

1 orange
1 lemon
125 ml water
2 tbsp. active dry yeast
57 g butter
156 ml milk
1 egg
90 g sugar + 1 tsp.
600-690 g flour
0.5 tsp salt

Instructions

Warm the water to 46°C (115°F) and whisk in the sugar and yeast. Allow to prove while preparing the next items.
Peel the lemon and orange, and remove any pith from the peel and fruit. Cut into quarters, and place all in the blender.
Warm milk and butter together, until the butter melts. Add to the blender and blend on high for 3 minutes.
Add sugar, salt, and egg and blend for another 2 minutes. Measure the mixture – it should be 625ml. If not, add more citrus juice to compensate.
Pour the mixture into a large bowl, and add the yeast mixture to it.
Stir in the flour, about 100g at a time, until the dough becomes a shaggy mass. Turn it out on to the table, and continue adding flour as you knead the dough for 8-10 minutes. It should be smooth and soft.
Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and allow to prove 1-1.5 hours, until doubled.
Punch down the dough, and let it rest 10 minutes.
While dough is resting, prepare your tins by greasing them or lining them with parchment paper.
Shape your dough, and place in the tins. Cover, and allow to rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1-1.5 hours.
When the dough is almost done proving, preheat the oven to 176°C (350°F).
Bake the loaves in the preheated oven for about 20-30 minutes, depending on the size of your tin.
Remove from the pan, and allow to cool.

PASKA DOUGHNUTS: A MODERN TAKE ON UKRAINIAN EASTER BREAD

acthiessen — Mon, 10 Apr 2017 23:20:00 +0000

The bakery that I work at in London, is quite well known for its doughnuts. When I first tried one without any filling, just the doughnut, I could only think of one thing. PASKA DOUGHNUTS! They use lemon zest in the dough, and the combination of yeast and citrus just brought back memories of paska. It’s not really strong enough to come through when there is a filling in it, but on its own, it’s like warm memories of my childhood.

For those of you who don’t know what paska is, it’s a yeasted Ukrainian Easter bread, flavored with lemon and orange. It’s usually served with sweetened cream cheese – or at least that’s what my grandma always made with it. And if you grew up in a Mennonite family, then you’re probably used to seeing paska with some simple icing on top, sprinkled with rainbow sprinkles… like this!

paska photo via Natasha’s Kitchen

But I wanted to make something different this year! So with those doughnuts as my inspiration, I decided to make paska-flavoured doughnuts! Using a recipe from Justin Gellatly’s cookbook Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding – I adapted it to include the paska flavor. All it took was increasing the amount of citrus zest exponentially, and changing the water to citrus juice. (I also used active dry yeast instead of fresh, as it’s kind of hard to find.)

These doughnuts aren’t too hard to make, but as with most good things, they do take time. The dough needs to rest overnight before you can work with it, so plan ahead! As it’s an enriched dough, the amount of butter and egg makes it quite sticky to work with, which is why overnight is best.

The original recipe said to shape the dough on a really floured tray, but I learned a trick in baking school! If you place the doughnut rounds on trays covered in parchment paper, simply cut the paper around each one! When you fry them, you use the paper to lift the doughnut into the oil, which prevents you from accidentally deflating them. Then, when you flip them over, the oil allows the paper to simply slide off.

doughnut rounds before proving, and after

fry doughnuts paper side up, then flip to remove

For the doughnut filling, I wanted to include the cream cheese flavor of the spread my grandma made. So I made a simple pastry cream and folded in cream cheese and whipped cream. I included some vanilla bean, for flavor, but it’s just optional. It’s a pretty subtle cream cheese flavor, so feel free to increase the amount if you wish, or even add some mascarpone for additional zing!

To finish these off, I decided to pay homage to the old-school paska of my youth, and topped them with sprinkles!

Of course, if you wanted these to look more grown up, you could always top them with some finely sliced citrus zest!

So what do you think? Will you ditch the traditional Easter bread in favor of something a bit adventurous this year? If not, and you’re still wanting to make a traditional bread, I’ve got some recipes coming up later this week… but for now, doughnuts!

Paska Doughnuts: A Modern Take on Ukrainian Easter Bread

Servings 20 Doughnuts

Ingredients

Doughnut Dough:
500 g white bread flour strong white
60 g caster sugar berry sugarplus extra for coating
10 g salt
7.5 g active dry yeast
4 eggs lightly beaten
zest of 3 lemons plus 75ml juice
zest of 3 oranges plus 75ml juice
125 g unsalted butter softened
2 ltrs neutral vegetable oil for frying
Doughnut Filling:
250 ml milk
50 g sugar
20 g cornstarch
1 egg yolk
0.25 vanilla bean or 0.25 tsp vanilla paste/extract
150 g cream cheese
250 ml double cream whipping
45 g caster sugar

Instructions

In a small bowl in the microwave, warm the orange and lemon juice to 46°C (115°F), and whisk in the yeast. Allow the mixture to sit for 5-10 minutes, until all the yeast is dissolved.
In a large bowl*, combine the yeast mixture, citrus zest, sugar, eggs, flour, and salt (layered in that order). Using a wooden spoon, stir until the dough starts to come together, then turn out onto a clean work surface.
Knead the dough at a medium pace, for about 8 minutes, being careful not to add any extra flour. This dough will be very sticky, so use a bench scraper to help you knead.
Allow the dough to rest for one minute.
Start kneading again, and add the butter in small amounts – kneading in each one before adding the next. Once you have added all the butter, knead at a fast pace for 5 minutes. The dough should be smooth and elastic.
Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover with cling film, and allow to prove for 1-1.5 hours. Punch the dough down, recover, and place in the fridge overnight.
While the dough is resting in the fridge, make your pastry cream.
In a medium bowl, mix together your egg yolk, cornstarch, and enough of the milk to thin it out a little.
Heat the remaining milk, sugar, and vanilla in a saucepan, over medium heat, until just simmering. Turn off the heat, cover, and allow to infuse for 20-30 minutes.
Bring the milk back up to a low boil, and slowly pour it into the egg yolk mixture, whisking the whole time to prevent the egg cooking.
Return the whole mixture to the pot, and cook over a medium heat, whisking constantly.
Once the mixture begins to thicken, remove from the heat for 10 seconds, and whisk vigorously. Return to the heat and allowing to come to a full boil, for 10-15 seconds- keep whisking.
Strain mixture onto a large piece of cling film, and wrap to make a little pillow. Chill in the fridge until cold.
The next day, remove the dough from the fridge, and divide into 50g pieces. You should get 20. Shape each of them on a table (you may want to lightly flour your hand) into a tight bun shape. Do this by cupping your hand over the piece, and moving your hand circles.
Place the rounds on parchment lined trays, and lightly cover with cling film sprayed with cooking oil to prevent sticking. Allow to prove in a warm place for 1.5-3 hours, or until doubled in size.**
When the dough is almost ready, begin heating the oil in a large pot over medium heat, until the temperature reads 180°C (356°F). You will need to be very careful working with the oil (it’s hot!), and try and check the temp. between each batch. Cut the parchment paper around each doughnut.
Fry the doughnuts in groups of 2 or three, for about 2 minutes on each side. Place them in the oil gently, by the parchment paper, and remove it once you have flipped the doughnuts.
Remove the doughnuts to a paper towel lined plate, to soak up any excess oil. While still warm, toss the doughnuts in a bowl of caster sugar.
Once all the doughnuts are fried, allow them to cool while you finish the filling.
Remove the pastry cream from the fridge, and warm for about 10-20 seconds in the microwave, then beat until smooth. Mix in the cream cheese. (taste and see if you want to add more)
Whip the double cream, and 40g caster sugar until stiff, then fold in the cream cheese pastry cream. Fill a piping bag, fitted with a small round nozzle, with the mixture, or a ziplock bag with a small hole cut in the corner.
Using a paring knife, cut a small hold in the side of each of the doughnuts, to allow you to fill them.
Stick your piping bag in the hole, and fill the doughnut, then pipe a small amount to cover the hole. Decorate with sprinkles, or citrus zest!

Notes

*Feel free to make in a stand mixer if you have one, using your dough hook. Simply mix on medium speed for the time shown. It’s much easier to use a machine with such sticky dough. **I always stay in my oven, which I briefly warm before turning off. If you add a dish of boiled water to the bottom of the oven, you won’t need cling film, as the steam keeps the dough from drying out.

Recipe adapted from Bread, Cake, Doughnut, Pudding (https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/193271/bread-cake-doughnut-pudding/)