Shavuot – a celebration for Bakers

When only dairy will do.

By FAYE LEVY, YAKIR LEVY
Cheese Babka from ‘The Holiday Kosher Baker’ (photo credit: MICHAEL BENNETT KRESS)
Cheese Babka from ‘The Holiday Kosher Baker’
(photo credit: MICHAEL BENNETT KRESS)
For those of us who love baking, Shavuot is the ideal occasion to enjoy our passion.
“Shavuot is the only holiday when most Jewish bakers entertain with dairy desserts,” writes Paula Shoyer in The Holiday Kosher Baker.
On other holidays, as well as Shabbat and for dinner parties, Shoyer’s meals are meat-based. It’s not surprising that after studying French pastry-making in Paris, she converted her favorite dessert recipes into dairyfree versions. But on Shavuot, she writes, when, like many Jews, she indulges in dairy feasts, “I feel like a kid in a candy store, eating forbidden treats.”
For Shavuot, Shoyer chooses desserts that she feels must be made with dairy products, like white chocolate mousse cake, cheese babka, and caramelized mocha and vanilla bean napoleons, as well as traditional treats like cheesecake, cheese blintzes and her grandmother’s noodle kugel, which is made with cottage cheese, cream cheese, sour cream and butter.
Leah Schapira and Victoria Dwek, authors of Dairy Made Easy, agree that some desserts should be made with dairy products and not with substitutes like margarine.
One of Schapira’s favorite desserts is peach and streusel napoleon made of wonton wrappers baked with butter and brown sugar, which are layered on serving plates with butter-sautéed peaches and crumbly, buttery streusel.
“This recipe will remind you why desserts are so much better with butter,” writes Schapira. “And what we’re missing out on when we’re making parve desserts. It’s amazing how such a simple ingredient can make something outstanding.”
Dwek feels that sour-cream chocolate-chip cake is another cake that should be made with dairy products. When she and a friend, Giordana Shalom, were discussing the wonders of butter, Shalom mentioned that the recipe for this cake had been in her family “forever.” “Whenever I tried to make it parve,” said Shalom, “it just wasn’t the same.”
This leads to an interesting question: In what types of desserts and baked goods are dairy products absolutely necessary? Often the answer is a matter of personal taste and family background. Someone who did not grow up with parve whipped cream might find a cake that’s frosted with it disappointing.
Occasionally I experiment with the same recipe using both margarine and butter. Recently I did so with chocolate-studded bar cookies flavored with dried fruit and sweet spices. Both batches were equally tasty, probably because the cookies had so many dominant flavors.
For my taste, delicately flavored desserts such as vanilla Bavarian cream and crème caramel need to be made with real milk and real cream. For the tastiest results, pastries, cakes and cookies that are classically made with a generous proportion of butter, such as croissants, brioche, pound cake and shortbread, should also be made the “real” way. Without butter, the aroma and flavor we expect will be missing. Similarly desserts and cakes that depend on cream for their good taste, such as strawberry shortcake, Black Forest cherry cake and sour cream coffee cake, need to be made with dairy cream.
With so many delicious dairy desserts, wouldn’t it be nice if Shavuot were celebrated several times a year?
■ The writer is the author of Fresh from France: Dessert Sensations and, in Hebrew, of Aruhot Halaviot (Dairy Dinners), published by R. Sirkis.
DASKAL’S CHEESECAKE
Leah Schapira and Victoria Dwek, authors of Dairy Made Easy, received this recipe for chocolate-topped cheesecake from Chanie Daskal, the baker behind Daskal’s Delights, whom they call “the cheesecake queen.” Note that this cake should be made a day in advance and refrigerated overnight.
Makes a 25-cm. (10-in.) round cake, 10 to 12 servings
Crust:
❖ 2 cups crushed chocolate-chip cookies
❖ 2 Tbsp. butter, melted
Cream cheese batter:
❖ 680 gr. (1½ lbs.) brick-style cream cheese, cut in pieces, room temperature
❖ 1 cup sugar
❖ 3 Tbsp. flour
❖ 1 Tbsp. vanilla sugar
❖ 4 eggs
❖ ½ cup plus 2 Tbsp. (5 oz. or 150 ml.) sour cream
❖ ¾ cup (6 oz. or 177 ml.) heavy cream
❖ 1 tsp. instant coffee diluted in 1 Tbsp. water
Topping:
❖ A 100-gr. (3.5-oz.) Rosemarie chocolate bar (a milk-chocolate praline bar) or bittersweet or semisweet chocolate
❖ 3 tsp. corn syrup
❖ 1 tsp. instant coffee diluted in 2 Tbsp. water
Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F). Line a 25-cm. (10-in.) springform pan with parchment paper.
In a small bowl, combine crushed cookies and butter.
Press into bottom of prepared pan.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat cream cheese with sugar until smooth. Add flour, vanilla sugar and eggs, one at a time.
In a medium bowl, whisk together sour cream, heavy cream and coffee mixture. Add to mixer bowl and mix just until combined. Pour batter over crust.
Bake on lower rack of oven for 1 hour. Let cool; refrigerate overnight before serving.
When cake is cool, prepare the topping: Melt the chocolate in a bowl set above hot water over low heat, or on low power in a microwave oven. Remove from heat. Whisk in corn syrup and coffee mixture. Spread over cooled cake.
CHEESE BABKA This luscious cake, from The Holiday Kosher Baker, is made from a butter-enriched yeast dough, a buttery crumb topping and a cream-cheese filling. Author Paula Shoyer notes that desserts made with cream cheese will come out smoother if you let the cream cheese come to room temperature before you make the batter.
Makes 14 servings
Dough:
❖ 1/3 cup (80 ml.) milk
❖ 7 gr. (¼ oz.) dry yeast
❖ 50 gr. (¼ cup) plus 1 tsp. sugar, divided
❖ 315 gr. (2¼ cups) all-purpose flour, plus 1 Tbsp. if needed, plus extra for dusting
❖ 113 gr. (4 oz. or ½ cup) unsalted butter, left at room temperature 30 minutes
❖ 1 large egg plus 1 white (reserve yolk for glazing)
Filling:
❖ 230 gr. (8 oz.) cream cheese
❖ 100 gr. (½ cup) sugar
❖ 1 large egg
❖ 2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
Crumbs:
❖ 65 gr. (½ cup) all purpose flour
❖ 75 gr. (1/3 cup packed) light brown sugar
❖ ½ tsp. cinnamon
❖ 57 gr. (4 Tbsp.) unsalted butter
To make the dough: Heat the milk over the stovetop or in a microwave oven until warm, not boiling. Pour the milk into a large mixing bowl or the bowl of a stand mixer.
Add the yeast and 1 tsp. sugar and let the mixture sit 10 minutes, until thick. Add the remaining 50 gr. (¼ cup ) sugar, 315 gr. (2½ cups ) flour, butter, and egg plus one white. Combine the ingredients with a wooden spoon or with a dough hook in a stand mixer on low speed until they are all mixed together. If the dough sticks to the bowl, add the additional tablespoon of flour and mix it in; the dough should come together into a ball. Cover the bowl with plastic and let the dough rise for one hour.
To make the filling: Meanwhile, put the cream cheese in a medium bowl and let it soften for 45 minutes. Add the sugar, egg and vanilla and combine using an electric mixer. Cover and refrigerate until the dough is ready.
To make the crumbs: Mix the flour, brown sugar and cinnamon in a medium bowl. Add the butter and rub the mixture between your fingers until you have small clumps. Set the bowl aside.
Preheat oven to 190°C (375°F). Sprinkle a 30-cm. x 36-cm. (12-in. x 14-in.) piece of parchment paper with flour. Roll the dough on top of the parchment paper until you have a 30-cm. x 36-cm. (12-in. x 14-in.) rectangle. Sprinkle more flour on the parchment paper if the dough sticks to the rolling pin.
Use a silicone spatula to spread the filling evenly over the dough. Roll the dough up the long way. Bring the ends together into a large ring and press them together.
Use a sharp knife to make cuts in the dough, every 2.5 cm. (1 in.) or so, on the outside of the ring, but cut only about three-quarters of the way into the ring, not all the way through. After you have made all the cuts, pull the slices apart slightly and turn each one so the swirl part is facing the next slice, partly facing up. Repeat all the way around.
Brush the dough all over with the remaining egg yolk mixed with a teaspoon of water. Sprinkle with the crumbs. Bake for 35 minutes, or until golden. Let cool for about 20 minutes.
Store covered at room temperature for up to three days or freeze for up to three months. Reheat to serve.