Classic Hungarian sour cherry strudel recipe with kneaded dough

The secret ingredient would be semolina, which does not let the dough soak too much from the filling. This recipe, however, uses ground biscuits instead. It is very rare nowadays that someone makes strudel at home, and if they do, people usually use pre-made strudel dough or just slap the frozen thing into the oven. But there is nothing like the food you make yourself, and hand-kneaded dough and fresh cherry filling in a strudel have no match. Naturally, it takes more time, but it is not as hard as some people might think, although thinning the dough might require some patience and skill.

You need to spread the dough as thin as possible – until it is almost transparent – with your fingers, so one must be careful and precise. You would also need to be careful when you roll the dough so that it does not tear, but there is also a trick for this thanks to SóBors. You can use a kitchen towel or some other cloth to help keep the dough from tearing when you roll up the strudel. The recipe is for 10 slices, which will probably be gone in seconds.

Ingredients:

Dough:
250 g flour
20 g oil
a pinch of salt
100 ml lukewarm water
1 egg (preferably small)
some oil for greasing

For putting the dough and filling together:
150 g butter (for the dough)
2 tablespoons of butter for greasing (before putting it in the oven)
70 g ground biscuits

Filling:
750 g sour cherry (without pits)
100 g sugar
120 g ground biscuits
½ teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons of butter
powdered sugar

Preparation:

Dough:
Put the ingredients of the dough into a bowl, mix them together, and then start kneading. If you have a kneading machine, it takes about 5-7 minutes, but naturally, it will take more time if you do it with your hands. The dough is good if it is soft, homogeneous, and pliable. Make a ball from the dough and spread a thin layer of oil on the outside. Put it into a bowl and let it sit for 45 minutes.

Filling:
Put the cinnamon, 120 g ground biscuits, and 3 tablespoons of butter into a small pot or saucepan and heat it until the butter melts. Mix the pitted cherries with the sugar and add the butter and biscuit mixture to it.

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Putting it together:
Now comes the most difficult part. Stretch the dough very thin on a floured surface until it is approximately a 25-30 cm (10-12”) rectangle and then put it on top of a kitchen towel or a piece of clean cloth. Now you need to stretch the dough with your fingers as thin as possible. Start from the middle. Reach under the dough with your fingers but keep your thumbs over the dough. Gently start pulling and stretching the dough towards the edges. You should repeat this process until the dough is so thin you could read a newspaper through it. Cut off the edges where the dough accumulated.

Grease the thin dough with 150 g of melted butter and then sprinkle the 70 g of ground biscuits into the lower third of the dough. Put the cherry filling on the lower third of the dough as well, but do not put filling on the bottom 5-6 centimetres (2-2.5”) of the dough because you need that space for folding. Now fold the bottom and the edges of the dough over the filling and start rolling it up with the help of the kitchen towel or cloth under it. When you rolled up the dough halfway, fold the edges of the dough as if you would do with a burrito, then roll the dough all the way up.

Put the rolled-up strudel into an oven pan lined with parchment paper. Grease the strudel with some melted butter and bake it in a 180°C oven for 45-60 minutes until the outside becomes golden brown. When it is done, take it out and wait for it to cool down. Sprinkle some powdered sugar on top, and it is ready to eat. With preparation and baking, it takes about two hours to make.

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Source: SóBors.hu