Stollen

By KitchenGnome

My German mother would make this every year for the holidays. This is my mother's recipe, that I grew up with. It is a buttery almond bread, topped with a thick dusting of powdered sugar. The perfect sweet bread for Christmas morning with coffee. I hope you enjoy it as much as our family has.

Ingredients

• 4 Cups Flour
• 3 tsp. baking powder
• 1 Cup Sugar
• Pinch Salt
• 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
• 1 tsp. Lemon Extract
• 4 Tbsp. Rum
• Generous pinch of Ground Cardamom
• Generous pinch of Ground Mace
• 2 Eggs
• 1 1/2 Sticks Cold Unsalted Butter
• 1 Cup Raisins
• 1 Cup Golden Raisins
• 8 oz. Ground Almonds
• 4 oz. Candied Lemon or Orange Peel
• 1 12 oz Carton Cottage Cheese, well drained
• 1/4 Cup Melted Butter
• Powdered Sugar to coat

Preparation

Step 1

Soak all of the raisins in the rum. Mix the flour and baking powder together and place on a pastry board. Make a well in the center and pour in the sugar, vailla, lemon extract and the eggs. Draw in some flour from the sides of the well to mix with these ingredients to form a thick paste. Add the cold butter, cut into small pieces, the cottage cheese, ground almonds, raisins with the rum and the candied peel. Work all of this together with your hands into a firm, smooth paste. If it should stick, add a little more flour. Form the mix into a long, oval shap and then fold it ofver lenthwise to give it the traditional stollen shape. Line a baking dish with greased waxed paper and place stollen on this. Preheat the oven for 5 minutes at 500 degrees. Then bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes. As soon as the stollen comes out of the oven, brush with melted butter and dust thickly with powdered sugar.