Daring Danish!

My first Daring Bakers Challenge and it was great fun. I never knew I could make Danish until now. Thanks to Kelly of Sass & Veracity, and Ben of What’s Cookin’? for their hosting of this month’s challenge. It was fun, guys! Anyway, the challenge was to make Danish Dough, and subsequently, Danish. The recipe/technique came from “Danish Braid” from Sherry Yard’s The Secrets of Baking. The recipe was really easy to follow. I read it 3/4 times and then decided it really wasn’t that hard. And it wasn’t.

By the time I rolled the dough out for the 4th time I had enough for two danish so I made two different kinds. The first was Lemon Blueberry. The filling was made with frozen blueberries ( Didn’t have fresh at the time), and home-made Lemon Curd. Recipe follows.

The dough or “Detrempe”.

With the butter block or ‘beurrage’.

After the 4th turn.

The dough with cuts. And the dough with filling. All braided and ready for the oven. And once it was finished, it looked pretty good for a first time. Those blueberries were REALLY juicy!!!. I did learn a few things from the first one. I didn’t leave enough room in the center for the filling because I made my cuts too long. And next time, a little sweetening in the egg glaze, or maybe just a sugar glaze when it comes out of the oven. The Fam liked it.

My second one was peaches and blueberries. I changed the cuts and was going to twist the dough as they came across the top of the danish. It looked pretty good until I tried to move it to the baking sheet. Unfortunately, I had not allowed time for the peaches I had poached in sugar with the berries to cool so when I lifted the danish to the sheet it fell apart on me. It was not a pretty sight. So I just added some twists of dough to the top to ‘fix’ it. Next time to the sheet and then add the warm filling. It was just as good to eat, just not pretty to look at!

The most important thing, I had fun with it. Thanks Daring Bakers for introducing us to a great new way to spend a day in the kitchen. I learned how to make Danish. Now, if I could just make all that low-fat, sugar free…. but then, what would be the point.

Lemon Curd
(Chelsea’s Tea Room)

In a heavy bottomed non-aluminum pan, combine egg yolks, sugar,and lemon juice. Cook over very low heat. Stir constantly with a wooden spoon. After 20/25 minutes when the mixture has come together and thickened to a pudding like consistency, remove from heat. Immediately whisk in butter and lemon zest, stirring until mixture has emulsified and it is smooth. Cool over an ice bath.
This can be stored in the fridge up to 3 days.

This is also good on scones.

On Flickr – how it was done – backwards!!!