Tag: Easter

Sweet Easter Loaves | Salt and pepper – Italian Cuisine

Ingredients for 4 people

The sweet Easter buns of Sale & Pepper they are special rustic cakes in the shape of a nest: delicious braids of leavened dough perfumed with anise seeds, shaped to form a ring that welcomes in the center a whole egg, with shell, which is baked in the oven until it is firmed. Sweet Easter buns are simple sweets of peasant tradition, diffused in various parts of Italy with different names; in particular in Liguria they are called "Cavagnetti"And in Molise"carousels"; therefore there are many regional recipes, handed down from family to family, whose preparation is a ritual that is repeated on the occasion of the religious festival. There is therefore no single right procedure to prepare them, but for all of them they symbolize the rebirth of life: they are eaten as a family or given to friends, enjoyed in company during the traditional Easter Monday trip as a sign of good luck. Try also those with Angelica style dough.

The sweet Easter buns of Sale & Pepper they are not particularly sweet but very fragrant! They are made with a pastry made with flour, eggs, butter and sugar and a little bit of milk that helps to mix the ingredients of the dough. To prepare them you need to be patient because the dough must rise so much before being divided into portions to form the nests. But your expectation will be rewarded by the scent of anise that these delicacies emit in cooking but also by the success they will receive among your guests. All you have to do is try the Salt & Pepper recipe: wear the apron and have fun with us preparing the sweet Easter buns!

Preparation of sweet Easter buns

1) Mix the yeast a flour and pour it on the work surface as a fountain. Whisk lightly 1 egg with the milk warm, a pinch of salt and it sugar and pour it in the center of the fountain; start to incorporate the flour into the egg and milk mix, then add the butter soft to small pieces.

2) Work well thedough until you get a smooth and elastic ball; place it in a large floured bowl, cut it with a cross cut and let it rise until it has doubled in volume.

3) Resume the dough and knead it a little more, adding a pinch of pepper and i aniseed. Divide the dough into 4 parts and obtains from each a loaf of 3 cm in diameter; fold it in half and twist the two parts together softly.

4) Place the braids, in the shape of a donut, on a plate lined with a sheet of baking paper, put 1 egg whole, washed and not shelled, in the center of each one and let it rise again for half an hour in a warm place.

5) Brush the surface of the sweet Easter buns with a bit of yolk beaten with a little water and a pinch of salt and cook the cakes in the oven at 180 ° C for 25 minutes.

Babka: the Polish Easter cake – Italian Cuisine

A sweet, glazed donut, typical of Polish Easter: this is the Babka recipe, a very sweet tradition

If you look for the Babka recipe online, you will certainly come across two very different preparations. One is that of a cake made from leavened dough, woven and soft, with a delicious filling of chocolate and butter.
If you are interested in the chocolate babka recipe read Babka: the delicious chocolate weaving.
The other is this high and soft donut that is prepared in Poland to celebrate Easter.
There Babka Wielkanocna, this is the original name, it is a cake that is prepared with very simple ingredients and can be enriched in many ways, with cocoa, candied fruit and with gassa as decoration.
Here is the classic recipe.

Babka recipe

Sift 150 grams of 00 flour, 100 grams of potato starch and 1 packet of baking powder.
Allow 200 g of butter to soften at room temperature and then mix it with 200 g of icing sugar and 4 egg yolks.
Add the flour and baking powder and then the almond extract, 50 grams of sour cream, the juice of a lemon and a handful of raisins (optional).
Finally mix everything very slowly with 4 beaten egg whites with 20 grams of sugar.
Pour everything into a well-buttered daisy ring-shaped mold and sprinkle with breadcrumbs.
Bake at 180 degrees for about 40 minutes.
Allow to cool before turning the cake away and then decorate with a glaze of icing sugar and lemon juice.

Chocolate version

There is an even more delicious version of this dessert ideal for chocolate lovers.
Just add the white or dark chocolate mixture melted in a bain-marie and let it cool. 50 gr.
Or you can also sift together two flour spoons of bitter cocoa.
In this case the perfect icing is the one prepared with fresh cream and chocolate, a classic ganache.
Adding chocolate to the dough or decoration is a great idea to creatively recycle chocolate eggs.

Easter decorations

Being a typical Easter recipe, bring it to the table with the right decorations.
You can then add chocolate eggs around the donut, also glazed and colored, or shortbread bunnies and then add almond flakes to add an extra touch of color.
Choose light and pastel colors for the decorations.

Chocolate Easter Egg – Italian Cuisine

For Easter, surprise everyone by making your own chocolate egg

Step by Step

- 1
- How to make a chocolate Easter egg
  
  1) Collect 600 g of chopped dark chocolate in a saucepan, immerse it in a bain-marie, checking that the water does not exceed the temperature of 45 ° C, and let it melt, stirring with a wooden spoon.
- 2
- 2) Remove the melted chocolate from the bain-marie and immerse yourself in the special thermometer to measure the temperature.
- 3
- 3) As soon as the thermometer shows 40 ° C, pour 2/3 of the melted chocolate on the work surface preferably of marble.
- 4
- 4) Work the chocolate with a large spatula until it has reached 27-28 ° C (touching it you must have a slight sensation of heat), then pour it into the saucepan, mixing it with the one left in the container: at this point the chocolate should have reached the temperature of 30-31 ° C.
- 5
- 5) Let the chocolate in 2 special polycarbonate molds of the size of a 350 g egg weight. Turn the mold around so that the chocolate adhere over the entire surface. Drain the excess chocolate into the saucepan. After trimming the contours, place the mold upside down on a sheet of baking paper and let it cool to room temperature.
- 6
- 6) Lift the molds with the two half chocolate shells from the paper when they are still a little soft and pour a second layer of melted chocolate, then put them upside down on the paper: the operation must be repeated 2-3 times up to reach a thickness of a couple of mm (keep the chocolate fluid in a water bath at 30 °).
- 7
- 7) When everything is well established, turn the two out half Easter eggs gently lifting the mold.
- 8
- 8) At this point you can decide whether to assemble thechocolate easter egg heating the edges of the two half shells on a non-stick pan and then pressing them together with a light pressure to get a whole, or to serve the half bowls on the table.
- 9
- 9) To decorate theEaster egg both complete and divided in half you can take advantage of white chocolate. Melt 100 g of White chocolate into small pieces, put it in a paper croissant and drop it into thin strips on the whole egg surface or even separated into two parts.
- 10
- 10) If you have decided to serve the half bowls, you can bring them to the table filled with luscious ganache cream, stuffed with a Bavarian cream or upside down surrounded by chickens and chicks in chocolate.