Strudel

Now, what's this? A German recipe? What does that have to do with French novels or Dutch backgrounds or living in Britain? Well... nothing. But my husband made it and someone asked for the recipe, and since my tagline reads 'with a European twist', I thought, why not? So here we go.

Ingredients:

For the dough:

• 250 g (2 cups) flour
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp oil
• 100 ml (1⁄3 cup) water

For the filling:

• 1-1.5 kg (2-3.5 lb) appels (usually around 6)
• 100 g (⅔ cup) almond flakes (or desiccated coconut, for the mistaken but also delicious variant)
• 100 g (½ cup) sugar
• juice of half a lemon
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 250-300 ml (8-10 oz) crème fraiche
• 190-200 g (1 cup) marzipan
• 90 g (3 oz) butter

Steps:

1. Heat a pot with water. You won't need the water, but the hot pot will hold the dough later.
2. Mix the dough ingredients together in a mixer with a dough hook. Start slowly and turn it up to high when everything is holding together.
3. Take the water out of the pot. Make yourself some tea with it if you're thirsty, but make sure the pot stays hot while you dry it.
4. Dust your work surface with some flour and take the dough out of the mixer for a final knead by hand.
5. Wrap the dough in some baking paper and leave it in the hot pot for about half an hour while you prepare your appels.
6. Peel your appels and cube them. I say cube... My slices are about 3 mm / 1⁄8 inch thick and I cut them into 1 cm / ½ inch bits. But if you like them less mushy and with more bite, you have less cutting to do! But you'll also have less time to plot... Or think about Christmas presents if you're not a mystery writer.
7. Add the sugar, lemon juice, almond/coconut, and vanilla to your apples.
8. Preheat the oven to 190°C or 375°F.
9. Melt your butter. You'll need it melted for a while, so maybe it's handy to keep it in a saucepan rather than a microwaved bowl.
10. Spread out a clean tea towel (ironed makes it easier to work with, if you can be bothered) on your work surface. Something like 50x70 cm / 20x27 inch will do nicely. Sprinkle it with a good amount of flour so you can hardly see the towel any more. 
11. Take the dough out of the pot, sprinkle a rolling pin with some flour and start rolling it out, as big as you can get it. If it doesn't quite reach the edges of the towel, you'll have to do the slightly tricky bit of pulling it out. First, though, brush your rolled dough with melted butter to make it more supple.
12. Then, lift a corner of your dough, reach under it and gently pull the dough out with the back of your hands. 
13. When you've covered the whole towel with your dough, spread a layer of crème fraiche over it (not too thick).
14. Now, if this will fit in your oven, I'm jealous. Me, I have to cut this dough in half. Leave about 3 cm / 1.5 inch at the top (short side) and sides to fold over later, and spread the rest of your dough with the apple mixture.
15. Grate the marzipan over the apple.
16. Brush the top of the dough with some more butter, but start by folding in the long sides. Then brush the tops of them with butter too.
17. Now it's time to start rolling. Lift the tea towel with the bottom(s) of the strudel(s) and gently fold the first bit over. Lifting the tea towel more and more should result in an evenly rolled strudel, that will stick to itself with the butter at the top.
18. Transfer the strudel to a greased baking sheet and unleash your inner artist with the butter brush.
19. Place the strudel in the oven, bake for 30 minutes.
20. You thought that was it? No! More butter! And back in the oven for another 15 minutes.
21. Your strudels should be golden brown by now, and the whole house smells of apple. Dust your yummies with some icing sugar and sit there staring at it until it's cooled enough to eat. A bit of custard or some vanilla ice cream will do no harm either!

This is the last recipe I'm putting up on my website. But have no fear! I'm only moving them to Patreon. Follow me there, and I'll keep your mouth watering. Plus, you'll be the first to know about book news, personal updates, and all kinds of other bonuses and extras. See you there!

Source: Bea on Youtube