Secrets of Christmas baking

Whatever the Christmas traditions of different countries, makes them one - among all sorts of festive dishes on the table must be present spicy sweet pastries. Gingerbread houses, cinnamon biscuits in the form of figures of reindeer, stars, or little people, flavored muffins with raisins, candied fruit with soft rolls, crispy sugar bagels ... not list all; each has its own culinary options for Christmas baking. But what would not be discussed - whether German or Scandinavian peperkok Stoll, in all these formulations will have plenty in common. 
Common denominator 

Almost all Christmas cake is prepared in advance. Historically, this is a very simple explanation: such dishes require the participation of "skoromnyh products: eggs, milk, butter - so they decided it was preparing on the eve of Advent and keep up to the holiday. 
What is the secret of their long storage? 

Dried fruit and / or syrup - necessary parties "long-playing baking, they can not grow stale cakes, biscuits and cakes. 

Role of boiled sugar syrup can also serve as maple syrup, honey, molasses (potato or corn). In today's recipes Christmas baking is fairly frequent unrefined - "brown" - cane sugar. 

Another common ingredient - spirits - not to impede the process cherstvleniya, but does not bake moldy, speaking as asepsis. The same is true of different spices - cloves, cinnamon, black pepper and pimento, and ginger. 

Ginger has long been known as a preservative, was used in the manufacture of various drinks and breads that not only adds to them some flavor, but also increased the shelf life. 

Not surprisingly, it was ginger - the main note of Christmas baking. 
What we have in the pudding? 

Sometimes you get confused what is meant by the word "pudding", it can be, and pastries such as cakes and cottage cheese dessert, such as yogurt. 

In fact, the English word "pudding" substituted the word "dessert". Pudding - is something that is traditionally prepared "third dish. Zharilos meat on skewers cooked in a large soup pot, but on this boiler in the rag for a couple and prepared pudding. This does not necessarily have been a sweet dish, but most often it is a dessert option. The famous Christmas Plum pudding originates from such dishes as "Plum-porridzh: oatmeal, boiled in meat broth with the addition of nuts, honey and prunes. Actually, due to Prune, the name and for the specific oatmeal, and for the Christmas pudding (plum - plum). 

In the classical formulations for the Plum-pudding are needed beef perinephric fat, nuts, dried fruit, baby rusks, caramelized syrup, or dark beer el top fermentation, eggs and spices. Prepares it in two days. Originally need to mix all ingredients and leave them on the day. And the next day boil it for a couple of 4 to 8 hours (depending on the size of the pudding). Be maintained a dish may, within six months, or even longer. Before serving, reheat it must also steamed. Pudding served not only hot, but burning, flambiruya rum or brandy. 

Other traditional British dish - a Christmas cake, is also preparing in advance (6 weeks before Christmas), its membership must include dried fruits, steeped in brandy or other aromatic distillate and molasses. Baked cake wrapped in foil or waxed paper, stored at room temperature and weekly soaked with cognac. 
German roots 

If England can be regarded as the birthplace of cakes, Germany holds the palm in the class cakes and cookies.
Primogenitor considered German Debouche (honey cake), and the capital "lebkuhenov" - the city of Nuremberg. Since 1996, the "Nuremberg lebkuhen" protected by the law on controlling the name of the place of birth. 

The first record of those sticks found in the monastic chronicles already in the XIII century. Of course, the recipes "honey cakes" were known in ancient Egypt. But the German know-how was it to add a large portion of spices in the dough: cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves. 

Unlike our usual solid cakes, scones Nuremberg "- soft, it is the dough used for the construction of various" gingerbread houses and other buildings and figurines. These cakes made to paint the colored glaze and chocolate. Just brown cakes are baked throughout the year, but special Christmas subtle differ starch coating, and their season comes in winter. Sometimes before baking gingerbread made in a small hole, so you can pass a string and decorate this cake tree. 

But the German Christmas cuisine is known not only cakes. Classic pie - Stoll - also has a long history. 

Let's start with the fact that the tunnels are a rare variant of yeast Christmas baking. For him, using very heavy and very biscuit dough. Stoll is baked with raisins, nuts, candied fruits, poppy seeds, and sprinkle with powdered sugar. Their shape and white color, he symbolized the infant Christ, and to the XV century, was a dish of "lean menus (kneading the dough by rapeseed oil). 

German nobles repeatedly appealed to the Pope - on the admissibility of butter in the baking, and in 1491 Pope Innocent VIII in "oily letter, authorized the use of baking. German gourmets, this assumption is cost expensive, because the replacement had to allocate funds for the construction of Freiberg Cathedral - as”repentance". But since those times Stoll confidently took his place at the festive table. 
Snacks mulled 

Scandinavian nations - known to fans Spiced hot alcohol: glegov and mulled wine. Virtually the same set of spices they use and while cooking the traditional Christmas cookies - peperkok (he piparkook Estonian, Latvian alias piparkukas). The dough for these cookies is very similar to the German gingerbread, but the products differ in that they are light, thin and crispy. Despite the presence in the title of "pepper", it is not intended that they pepper, black pepper, if added, in small quantities. Rather appropriate additives allspice, a well - cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, and sometimes orange peel. Cookies do not get "pepper", but spicy. For the dough is also used molasses or brown sugar. 
And what do you have? 

If you do not have time to stock up the cake in advance, you should not completely abandon the idea of Christmas baking. Two or three weeks is enough to make your cake or cake managed to ripen. You can use the classic recipes, and you can unleash the imagination: in addition to raisins and prunes add to your baked dried cherries, figs, candied pineapples and mangoes. Aromatize "children's cake" is not alcohol, and oil of bitter almonds. Knead the flour with cocoa powder, or add pieces of chocolate. And it is possible some of the flour substitute nuts, pulverized into powder (almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts). 

I'm making a Christmas cake, based on the recipe for "a quarter the cake," which in England is called "pound" as the French quartet-quarts (four quarters), it is easy to remember: all the main products are taken in equal proportions: in ¼ pieces. 

The mass of egg count of 50 grams each (it's egg "first category"), then at 5 eggs, we need 250 grams of flour, 250 grams of butter and 250 grams of brown sugar. Moreover in the dough adds about 300 grams of dried fruits and nuts, in advance of soaked in an aromatic distillate (brandy, rum, whiskey, liquor), I soaked them for at least a week before baking and store in a closed container. This is a major proportion; the total amount of the test can be reduced or increased depending on your appetites. 

All products for the cake should be at room temperature (eggs butter and remove from the refrigerator in advance). Whip the butter with sugar until they are smooth, and then enter one egg, each time whipping up density. Gradually add the flour and dried fruits in the end, which should be dipped in flour, so they are uniformly distributed in the test. Bake in an oven heated to 150 degrees about 1,5 hours or even longer. The degree of willingness to identify a wooden toothpick. 

Note: this dough you can bake in a square shape or in a special circular (with a hole in the middle), or distribute small portions in small bowls. In the latter case, baking time is reduced to 40-45 minutes. 

Finished cake should allow to cool in the form, and then on the grid in the oven. Cooled cake wrapped in foil, put in the closet and forgotten until Christmas Eve. However, its flavor will not allow itself to forget. 

As soon as I put my cake in the oven, my daughter took a nose and said: 

- Estonia smells... 

Then he added: 

- Tallinn Old Town... 

And then clarified: 

- Christmas Fair at the Town Hall Square! 

The girl has a good nose...