Because my husband is from Wisconsin, I'm familiar with kringle. I've always thought the flat oval shape is amusing because it looks like something fell on top of the kringle and smushed it -- but the slim profile does make it easier to pack a kringle in your suitcase to bring it home from Wisconsin (which is something we have done). And even if you can't make it to the badger state, kringle is pretty easy to get a hold of locally because Trader Joe's sells kringle from O&H Danish Bakery in Racine, WI.
I had never attempted making my own kringle until I saw that Shauna Sever had a recipe for "Danish Kringle" in Midwest Made. The recipe uses a shortcut yeasted laminated Danish dough that requires some (but not too much) advance planning. You make the dough by blending bread flour, sugar, instead yeast, and salt in a food processor; pulsing in cold cubed butter; dumping the mixture into a bowl and stirring in cold milk and an egg; and kneading the dough a few times until it comes together. You wrap the dough in plastic and chill it for at least four hours. Then you roll out the dough and make six letter folds and turns, two at a time, resting the dough in the fridge for at least 20 minutes between each pair of turns.
This recipe yields two kringles, so you divide the dough in half before filling and shaping the pastry. I rolled out each piece of dough into a very long, narrow rectangle, and spread a strip of almond filling (almond paste, softened butter, powdered sugar, egg white, lemon juice, and salt) lengthwise down the middle. I folded both sides of the dough over the center to encase the filling, using egg white to help the dough adhere and pinching the seam shut. Then I formed each filled strip of dough into an oval and placed it on a parchment-lined baking sheet, seam-side down. After a quick rise, I brushed the dough with egg white and baked the kringles until golden. Right after you take the kringles out of the oven, you flatten them by pressing down on them with another baking sheet.
After the kringles are completely cooled, you spread on a icing made from powdered sugar, salt, water, and vanilla (I used vanilla paste instead of extract, which is why you can see little specks of vanilla seeds in the glaze in the photo above). The filling set firm, opaque, and matte; I thought the finished kringles looked great. Although apparently I didn't do a great job sealing the dough shut around the filling, because while one of my kringles (pictured above) came out nice and intact, the other one had a bit of almond filling leaking out into the center.
I loved the dense almond filing and the sweet, rich icing, which both get an A. But I can't figure out where I went wrong with the pastry, because it wasn't flaky. I could see the layers of lamination when I cut my dough into two pieces before filling and shaping the pastries, and I was pretty meticulous about making my letter folds and turns, and ensuring that the dough rested in the fridge and didn't get too warm. Yet, my kringle seemed liked it was made with ordinary yeasted dough instead of laminated pastry. Tom agreed with me that everything else about the kringle was correct and it definitely tasted good -- but the lack of flakiness was conspicuous. I'm going to have to try this recipe again to see if I can get a flakier result.
Recipe: "Danish Kringle" from Midwest Made by Shauna Sever; a close (but not exact) adaptation is available here at New York Times Cooking.
I had never attempted making my own kringle until I saw that Shauna Sever had a recipe for "Danish Kringle" in Midwest Made. The recipe uses a shortcut yeasted laminated Danish dough that requires some (but not too much) advance planning. You make the dough by blending bread flour, sugar, instead yeast, and salt in a food processor; pulsing in cold cubed butter; dumping the mixture into a bowl and stirring in cold milk and an egg; and kneading the dough a few times until it comes together. You wrap the dough in plastic and chill it for at least four hours. Then you roll out the dough and make six letter folds and turns, two at a time, resting the dough in the fridge for at least 20 minutes between each pair of turns.
This recipe yields two kringles, so you divide the dough in half before filling and shaping the pastry. I rolled out each piece of dough into a very long, narrow rectangle, and spread a strip of almond filling (almond paste, softened butter, powdered sugar, egg white, lemon juice, and salt) lengthwise down the middle. I folded both sides of the dough over the center to encase the filling, using egg white to help the dough adhere and pinching the seam shut. Then I formed each filled strip of dough into an oval and placed it on a parchment-lined baking sheet, seam-side down. After a quick rise, I brushed the dough with egg white and baked the kringles until golden. Right after you take the kringles out of the oven, you flatten them by pressing down on them with another baking sheet.
Recipe: "Danish Kringle" from Midwest Made by Shauna Sever; a close (but not exact) adaptation is available here at New York Times Cooking.
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