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Cooking
Apricot Kolache with Sweet Cheese and Almond Crumble
· 15 servings
Mix the dry ingredients
Sift the flour with a pinch of salt into a large bowl. Add the granulated sugar, dried yeast and grated lemon zest, and mix everything together while still dry.
Add the wet ingredients
Make a well in the mixture and pour in the lukewarm milk. Add the room-temperature egg yolks and the lukewarm melted butter.
Work the dough
Bring everything together and knead thoroughly. In a stand mixer with a dough hook, let it run for about 13 minutes on medium speed. The dough should be smooth, elastic, and should not stick to the sides of the bowl.
Let it rise
Lightly grease the dough and bowl with oil, cover with a tea towel and leave to rise somewhere warm for 1 to 1.5 hours, until doubled in size.
Shape into balls
Turn the risen dough out onto a work surface and divide into 15 equal pieces (about 60 g each, or smaller at 45–50 g if you like). Roll each piece in your palms into a smooth ball and arrange on baking trays lined with parchment paper, leaving space between them.
Let rise a second time
Cover the balls on the tray loosely with a tea towel and let them rest for an hour. This makes it easy to shape a thin center afterwards.
Mix the sweet cheese filling
In a bowl, combine the curd cheese (tvaroh), ricotta, egg yolks, icing sugar, vanilla sugar and cornstarch. Whisk until smooth and creamy.
Make the buttery crumble
Put the flour, sugar and cold butter, cut into cubes, into a bowl. Add the sliced almonds and cinnamon. Rub everything together with your fingers until it forms buttery crumbs.
Cut the apricots
Pit the apricots and cut into wedges or quarters. If they're on the tart side, sprinkle them lightly with sugar.
Shape the wells
Preheat the oven to 180 °C (top and bottom heat). Once the balls have relaxed, use your fingers or the floured bottom of a glass to press down the centers until almost paper-thin, leaving just a puffy rim about 1 cm wide.
Fill the kolache
Brush the rims with beaten egg. Spoon the sweet cheese filling into the middle and spread it over the thin center. Arrange the apricots on top of the cheese and finish with a generous layer of crumble.
Bake until golden
Place the trays in the oven and bake for about 15–20 minutes. Keep an eye on them — they're ready once the edges turn golden and the crumble starts to turn crisp.
Brush with Amaretto butter
While the kolache are still hot, brush the edges with melted butter mixed with a splash of Amaretto. Let them cool slightly before serving.