Kolache

Ingredients

Dough

• 500 gplain flour
• 10 gfresh yeast
• 200 mlwarm milk
• 80 gsugar
• 100 gbutter, melted
• 3egg yolks
• 1 tspsalt
• zest of 1 lemon

Fillings

• 250 gquark or tvaroh, with 1 egg yolk and 50 g sugar
• 250 gpovidla plum butter
• 200 gground poppy seed cooked with milk and sugar

Streusel

• 50 gflour
• 40 gbutter
• 40 gsugar

To finish

• melted butter
• icing sugar

Directions

1. Make a soft enriched dough with the flour, yeast, warm milk, sugar, melted butter, yolks, salt and zest, and knead it 10 minutes.
2. Prove for 1 hour 30 minutes until doubled.
3. Divide into pieces of about 60 g and roll each into a smooth ball.
4. Set them well apart on a lined tray and prove for a further 30 minutes.
5. Now press a wide, deep well into the centre of each ball with the base of a glass or your knuckles.
6. Press it right down almost to the tray and make the well wide. A shallow dip closes up in the oven and the filling slides off the top.
7. Fill each well generously, either with one filling or with two side by side.
8. The three classic fillings are tvaroh, povidla and poppy seed, and a tray with all three is how a Czech bakery sells them.
9. Rub the streusel ingredients together into crumbs and scatter them over.
10. Prove for 15 minutes more, just until the dough round puffs slightly around the filled well.
11. Bake at 190°C (375°F) for 15 to 18 minutes, until golden.
12. Brush with melted butter as they come out and dust with icing sugar once cool.
13. They are open-faced and round, which is the Czech original. The filled, enclosed Texas kolache is a descendant of Moravian emigrants and is a different pastry.
14. The plural is koláče and a single one is a koláč, which Czechs are particular about.
15. The very large ones, made for weddings and cut into pieces, are the older form and are where the word comes from.
16. Eat them the day they are made, with coffee.

Technique

• Povidla is thick slow-cooked plum butter, barely sweetened, and ordinary plum jam is too loose.
• Tvaroh is the Czech fresh curd cheese; quark is the closest thing sold elsewhere.
• Wedding kolache, svatební koláčky, are made tiny and given to guests in bags.

Substitutions

• Quark, or ricotta drained overnight and sweetened.
• Damson or prune jam cooked down further, in place of povidla.

Variations

• Svatební koláčky, made small for weddings.
• Frgál, the very large Wallachian version.
• The Texas kolache, enclosed and often savoury with sausage.

History

Round yeast pastry with poppy, curd or plum filling; Czech emigrants took it to Texas, where a town holds an annual kolache festival.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kolache?

Kolache is a bread & pastry from Czechia: round sweet yeast buns topped with quark, poppy, plum jam. Round yeast pastry with poppy, curd or plum filling; Czech emigrants took it to Texas, where a town holds an annual kolache festival.

How long does Kolache take to make?

Kolache takes 40 min plus 2 hr rising of preparation and 20 min of cooking. The recipe makes about 16. It is rated medium to make.

What can I substitute in Kolache?

Yes, within limits. Quark, or ricotta drained overnight and sweetened. Damson or prune jam cooked down further, in place of povidla.