Cream Cheese Kringle

Ingredience

Filling

8 ounces softened cream cheese

¼ cup (1¾ ounces) granulated sugar

½ teaspoon lemon zest

Dough

4 cups (20 ounces) all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar

1 envelope (2¼ teaspoons) rapid-rise or instant yeast

¾ teaspoon salt

16 tablespoons (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces and chilled

4 tablespoons vegetable shortening, chilled, cut into ½-inch pieces

2 cups sour cream

1 large egg, lightly beaten

Glaze

1 cup (4 ounces) confectioners’ sugar

2 tablespoons whole or low-fat milk

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Pokyny

1. For the Filling Combine cream cheese, sugar, and lemon zest in bowl.

2. For the Dough Add flour, sugar, yeast, salt, butter, and shortening to empty food processor and pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal. Transfer to bowl and stir in sour cream until dough forms. Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface and divide in half. Pat each half into 7- by 3-inch rectangle and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate dough for 30 minutes, then freeze until firm, about 15 minutes.

3. Roll dough following photos 1 to 4 (right), roll one dough half into 28- by 5-inch rectangle, cover bottom half of strip with half of filling, fold dough over filling, and pinch seams closed. Shape into oval, tuck one end inside of other, and pinch to seal. Transfer to parchment-lined, rimmed baking sheet, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate at least 4 or up to 12 hours. Repeat with remaining dough and filling.

4. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Discard plastic, brush kringles with egg, and bake until golden brown, 40 to 50 minutes, switching and rotating sheets halfway through baking. Transfer kringles to wire rack and cool 30 minutes.

5. For the Glaze Whisk sugar, milk, and vanilla in bowl until smooth. Drizzle glaze over kringles. Let glaze set 10 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature. (Kringle can be stored in airtight container at room temperature for 2 days.)

Poznámky

If the dough appears shaggy and dry after adding the sour cream in step 2, add up to 2 tablespoons ice water until the dough is smooth. If the capacity of your food processor is less than 11 cups, pulse the butter and shortening into the dry mixture in two batches at the beginning of step 2.

Pecan Filling: Prepare Cream Cheese Kringle, omitting cream cheese filling. In step 1, process ¾ cup packed light brown sugar, 1 cup toasted pecans, ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon, and ⅛ teaspoon salt in food processor until pecans are coarsely ground. Add 4 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces, and pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal. Transfer to bowl. In step 3, spread half of pecan mixture over bottom of dough and continue with recipe as directed. Repeat with remaining dough and pecan mixture.

Double Berry: Filling Do not substitute raspberry jam for the preserves; it will leach out of the kringle.

Prepare Cream Cheese Kringle, omitting cream cheese filling. In step 1, combine ½ cup raspberry preserves and ¼ cup finely chopped dried cranberries in bowl. In step 3, spread half of preserves mixture over bottom half of dough and continue with recipe as directed. Repeat with remaining dough and preserves mixture.

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS In Racine, Wisconsin, kringle is king. This oval-shaped Danish combines the richness of sweet yeast dough with some of the flakiness of puff pastry. A traditional kringle takes three days of careful folding and chilling to achieve its tender layers, but we used a few tricks to achieve the same result in a fraction of the time. A generous amount of sour cream in the dough weakened the gluten structure, in effect mimicking the flaky texture of an authentic kringle. Lots of butter is key to a kringle’s rich flavor and tenderness, but too much can cause greasiness. We replaced some with shortening, which is a tenderizer that helped balance the texture and flavor. A stir-together cream cheese filling and a quick glaze completed the kringle.