Strawberry and rhubarb zopf cake

Baking sweet
Total: 3 hr | Active: 45 min.
vegetarian

This zopf or yeast cake is a twist on the classic braided loaf with nut filling. This version is wonderfully fruity and can also be made out-of-season with frozen fruit. What’s more, this yeast cake can easily be made vegan by replacing the butter with margarine and the milk with plant-based milk. Both versions taste delicious.

Recipe by:
Nadja - LouMalou

Ingredients

for 12 pieces

Yeast dough
480 g zopf flour
1 tsp salt
20 g sugar
1 parcel dry yeast (7 g)
3 dl milk
60 g butter, soft
Filling
150 g rhubarb, cut into pieces
150 g strawberries, cut into pieces
3 parcel bourbon vanilla sugar
20 g Maizena cornflour
2 tbsp water
125 g strawberry & rhubarb jam
Icing
150 g icing sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
4 tbsp flaked almonds

How it's done

Yeast dough

Mix the flour, salt, sugar and yeast in a bowl. Add the milk and butter, mix, knead to form a soft, smooth dough. Cover the dough and leave to rise at room temperature for approx. 1½ hrs. until doubled in size.

Filling

Place the rhubarb, strawberries and vanilla sugar in a pan, cover and cook for approx. 10 mins. until soft. Puree the fruit until smooth, return to the pan. Stir the cornflour into the water, add to the fruit puree, boil fast for approx. 3 mins. while stirring. Stir in the jam, leave the filling to cool.

To shape

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to make a square (approx. 27 x 27 cm). Set aside 2 tbsp of filling, spread the remainder of the filling over the dough, leaving a border of approx. 2.5 cm all the way around. Tightly roll up the dough. Cut the roll in half lengthwise, braid the strands with the cut sides facing up, place in the prepared loaf tin.

To bake

Approx. 45 mins. in an oven preheated to 180°C (convection). Cover the cake with foil after approx. 30 mins. Remove, allow to cool slightly.

Icing

Combine the reserved filling with icing sugar and lemon juice. Remove the cake from the tin, brush with the icing, sprinkle the almond slivers on top and leave to cool on a rack.

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