Chocolate Brioche Krantz

One of my favorite things about Vienna is the abundance of Jewish pastries everywhere (or pastries in general for that matter). I grew up sampling and comparing everything sweet in sight, purely for research purposes, of course. Ever since I was very little I've had an obsession with history and the origins of traditional foods. If we ever meet in person, never strike up a conversation on bagels, because you'll probably have to listen to a monologue for the next hour or so. We've made it no secret that we love Israeli food and Ottolenghi has written several of our favorite cookbooks, but we've never done a traditional sweet pastry (don't worry I've got you covered with a bagel recipe here). So here it is: chocolate babka with hazelnuts (we didn't have any hazelnuts left, so we used walnuts as a prop, and let's be honest they're a lot prettier anyways...). What's your favorite traditional pastry?

Chocolate Babka (recipe by Yotam Ottolenghi)

530g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
100g caster sugar
2 tsp fast-action dried yeast
grated zest of 1 small lemon
3 large free-range eggs
120ml water
⅓ tsp salt
150g unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into 2cm cubes
sunflower oil, for greasing

Chocolate filling:
50g icing sugar
30g best-quality cocoa powder
130g good-quality dark chocolate, melted
120g unsalted butter, melted
100g pecans, roughly chopped
2 tbsp caster sugar

Combine flour, yeast, sugar and lemon zest in a big bowl. Add the eggs one by one until well mixed (if you have a kitchen aid, that works perfectly well). Add the water, salt and butter and form to a ball once combined. Put the dough in a warm place and cover it with a damp cloth and let it rise for about 2 hours, or until doubled in mass.

In the meantime you can melt the butter with the chocolate and add the icing sugar and cocoa powder to make the filling. Once the dough has risen, roll it out to a rectangle and spread the filling over it (optionally you can sprinkle it with nuts now). Then roll the dough over the longer sides of the rectangle and cut the roll in half. Try to braid the two halves the best you can (it's going to get very messy) and place the braid in a rectangular form. Bake for 30 mins at 190C.

Goodbye 2015

If I could sum up 2015 in just one word I would use "unexpected". I took 40 flights and explored more places than I could have ever dreamed of. I went to Hong Kong, Macau, Lech, Rome, Miami, Boston, Washington DC, Seattle, Portland, London, Dorset, Paris, Iceland, Copenhagen, Germany, Arizona, Mexico, San Francisco, Big Sur and Bermuda. Looking back, it's crazy to realize how I'm always on the go, but I always feel like I'm doing something wrong if I'm not adventuring around this incredible world of ours. I also had to learn some hard lessons in 2015, but it's only made me stronger and value the good people in my life even more than before. I hope you realize that this will always be my highlight reel and I go through the same struggles, hardships and losses every day that you do as well. 2015 also taught me that unexpected kindness can go a long way and you'll never regret being the kindest version of yourself and working on yourself with every passing day. As always, thank you so much for following along on my adventures and I hope you have a wonderful 2016 ahead!

The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page. - Saint Augustine

Applestrudel

Each year we start off with high hopes and anticipation for the most important family time of the year, Christmas. Weeks before Christmas even the ignorant start watching the weather forcast in order to find out how likely the white decoration from above is going to make it down the valleys of the nation. And each year the white fluff becomes more and more a moody, erratic, fickle memory. OK I admit I am so disappointed!

This year instead of skiiing and cross country, sledding and watching ski races, we are hiking with a rather bad mood, as we all must now admit, Global Warming is reality and the draught that we will have to face soon indepensable. No snow, no melting water from the mountains ... Tell me, shall we not be alarmed?

A cry for comfort food breaks free and lots of white powder sugar piled on top. At least some white fluff, and a compromise on my diet in the week between two major feasts. Skipping lunch for this afternoon treat is worth the wait and the house is filled with soothing aromas.
For the first time in my life I made the dough all by myself. I thought this was quite the challenge because here in Austria you can buy strudel dough in every supermarket. But making my own was on my list all my life and 2015 had to end on a bucket list shorter than it started out, just for the record. And it was super easy. I found this recipe in a cookbook by Lafer and I made up the filling while at it. Because I cannot stand raisins and I wanted to try a new go on apple strudel with apples and nuts only. No breadcrumbs as in the original recipe. So please try it for yourself the dough is super stretchy and didn't break once and the filling far less sweet than usual.

See how elastic and easy to handle the dough is, you will succeed! Promise!

Print recipe

Preparation time 1,5 hours
Chilling 2 hours
Baking time 25-30 min
Oven temperature 200°C | 400°

You Need

Dough
200g | 1 ¾ cups flour
2 tbsp sunflower oil
1 dash of salt
120 ml | ½ cup lukewarm water
1 tbsp oil to cover the dough before refrigerating
Filling
1 kg | 2,4 pounds apples, peeled, core removed, quartered and cut in slices
juice from 1 ½ lemons
80 g sugar
80 + 80 g butter
110 g ground almonds
50 g ground hazelnuts
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
 

Making the dough is the first step. Put all ingredients in a bowl and attach the dough hook, knead after combined another 5 minutes to allow the dough to become elastic and smooth. Brush with some oil and refrigerate covered with cling wrap for about 2 hours.

Wash and peel the apples, quarter them and remove the core with the seeds. Cut slices and marinate in a clean bowl with the juice of the lemons.
In a little saucepan warm 80g of butter to be used to brush the dough with.
In another pan on medium heat roast the grounded nuts with the butter, season with cinnamon and sugar and set aside to cool.

The dough can be divided in two equal parts to make two smaller strudels. On a floured work surface roll out the dough until thin enough them lift off the dough and stretch it over the back of your hand pulling slightly, turning the dough round and round over your hand helping it to become thin like a sheet almost see through and as large as 2 sheets of A4 maximum. Spread a soft and slightly moist tea towel on your work surface and place the dough straight on it. Brush the entire upper side with butter, place half of our marinated apples on the first lower half, leave 3 cm (a little over an inch) to the edges free and cover with the roasted nut mix. Lift the left and right side and fold in to the middle to make the ends secure, brush the visible sides again with butter, this way they will stick together and hold the filing in. Then take the tea towel and lift it from you with the dough and filling, roll it away from you, the filling will move a bit while being rolled and with the upper empty part of the dough close the strudel. Now the rolled strudel sits still on your tea towel. Line a form or a baking sheet with parchment paper and lift the strudel with the help of the tea towel carefully let the strudel roll softly on the paper. Do the last steps one more time and leave some space between the two strudels. Brush again with butter on the top and bake until crisp and brown, 25-30 minutes. Serve warm with some whipped cream and loads of powdered sugar.

Remnants of Autumn

Sometimes New York surprises us with incredibly mild weather, but this December has been above and beyond mild. I've been told it's been warmer than San Diego this year, but I'm not going to question it and embrace this second round of autumn. It's my all time favorite season after all and no city does fall better than New York. Although I'm in the midst of finals week right now, I had to take some breaks to stroll around and enjoy the beautiful weather last weekend to capture the last remnants of autumn in the prettiest corners of the city, not to mention to make use of my last opportunity to wear sleeveless coats and eat breakfast outside this year.

Photo of me by Kevin Wong.

Jo Malone London

Last week, the lovely Jo Malone London team invited me over to their new boutique at The Shops at Columbus Circle to see the holiday decorations and try out their newest products, like their Mimosa & Cardamom Cologne. I knew I loved their scented candles, but I had no idea there was so much more to the brand.

After I had a chance to smell each of the fragrances at the Discovery Table, a Jo Malone London stylist walked me through their fragrance combining philosophy, which encourages you to layer scents together to create your own unique scent. My personal favorites were the Wild Bluebell and the Nectarine Blossom & Honey. You can also call ahead and schedule a hand and arm massage to try out combinations of hand & body wash, hand & body lotion and cologne to see what different scents would be like together, or for a little after work pick me up and relaxation.

If you're still shopping for Christmas gifts, they have some gorgeous options (not to mention the pretty packaging!). I've linked my favorites for you below.

Thank you to Jo Malone for sponsoring this post.