Cin­na­mon Streusel Babke

JUNE EDEL­MUTH

MMCC’s Natanya and Lisa were togeth­er at a friend’s 50th and spent far too long stand­ing way too close to June Edelmuth’s renowned cin­na­mon and sug­ar-swirled babke, peel­ing off lay­er after lay­er of doughy deli­cious­ness. June has become known all over Syd­ney for this leg­endary cake; the recipe comes from her Russ­ian grand­moth­er Min­ka and is now a cher­ished MMCC favourite.

Dough

565 g (3¾ cups/​1 lb 4 oz) plain
(all-pur­pose) flour, plus extra

150 g (⅔ cup/​5⅓ oz) cast­er (superfine) sugar

1 tea­spoon salt

60 ml (¼ cup/​2 fl oz) warm water

10 g (1½ sachets/​3½ tea­spoons) active dried yeast

1 tea­spoon white (gran­u­lat­ed) sugar

2 eggs

1 egg yolk

155 g (5½ oz) unsalt­ed butter

80 ml (⅓ cup/​2¾ fl oz) pure (35%) cream

60 ml (¼ cup/​2 fl oz) milk

Fill­ing

100 g (3½ oz) unsalt­ed but­ter, melt­ed and lukewarm

80 g (½ cup/​2¾ oz) sultanas
(gold­en raisins)

Cin­na­mon sugar

25 g (2½ tablespoons/​1 oz) ground cinnamon

375 g (1⅔ cups/​13¼ oz) cast­er (superfine) sugar

Streusel top­ping

90 g (⅔ cup/​3¼ oz) plain
(all-pur­pose) flour

45 g (1½ oz) unsalt­ed but­ter, at room tem­per­a­ture, chopped

55 g (¼ cup/​2 oz) cast­er (superfine) sugar

Also need­ed

50 g (1¾ oz) unsalt­ed but­ter, melted

Com­bine the flour, cast­er sug­ar and salt in the bowl of a stand mix­er and make a well in the cen­tre. In a sep­a­rate bowl, com­bine the warm water, yeast and white sug­ar and allow to stand for 10 min­utes or until frothy, to ensure the yeast is active. In a sep­a­rate bowl, mix togeth­er the eggs and the yolk.

In a small saucepan, warm the but­ter, cream and milk togeth­er until the but­ter is just melt­ed; do not allow the mix­ture to boil. Set aside until it is luke­warm. Pour the yeast mix­ture into the well then add the eggs and the milk mix­ture. Using a wood­en spoon, stir to com­bine then grad­u­al­ly incor­po­rate the flour until you have a rough dough. Using the dough hook attach­ment, knead on low – medi­um speed for 10 min­utes or until you have a smooth dough that starts to come away from the sides of the bowl. Cov­er the bowl with bak­ing paper and plas­tic wrap and allow to rise in a warm place for 3 hours or until dou­bled in volume.

To make the cin­na­mon sug­ar, com­bine the cin­na­mon and sug­ar in a bowl and set aside.

To make the streusel top­ping, rub togeth­er the flour, but­ter and sug­ar with your fin­ger­tips to make a fair­ly fine crum­ble. Set aside.

Line a round 30 cm (12 inch) cake tin or a deep square 25 cm (10 inch) bak­ing dish. When the dough has risen, punch it down by throw­ing the dough onto a light­ly floured bench­top. Do not knead or add more flour, as this will tough­en the dough. Divide into 2 equal pieces. Roll out 1 piece to a large rec­tan­gle, about 65 x 40 cm (25½ x 16 inch­es). Brush with half the melt­ed but­ter, sprin­kle with half the cin­na­mon sug­ar and scat­ter over half the sul­tanas. Roll up length­ways to form a log. Repeat with the remain­ing dough.

Cut each log into 5 cm (2 inch) sec­tions. Place these in a cir­cu­lar fash­ion into the pre­pared tin, start­ing from the out­side, cut side up, leav­ing about 1 cm (½ inch) between each one. Once the pieces are all in place and even­ly dis­trib­uted in the tin, press down gen­tly with your hand so they are all the same height. Brush with the extra melt­ed but­ter and then sprin­kle even­ly with the streusel top­ping. Cov­er with a light tea tow­el and allow to rise for
a fur­ther 2 hours or until almost dou­bled in volume.

Pre­heat the oven to 170°C (340°F/Gas 3). Bake for 1 hour or until a skew­er insert­ed into the cen­tre comes out clean. Remove from the oven. Serve warm or cov­er with a light tea tow­el until cool. If you wish, reheat it lat­er, wrapped in foil.

Serves about 20