Easter cake craffin orange-chocolate

To prepare two types of yeast dough for Easter Easter cakes, we will need the following ingredients: premium wheat flour, milk, chicken eggs, butter, granulated sugar, unsweetened cocoa powder, orange zest, turmeric, instant yeast and table salt (preferably finely ground).

It’s most convenient to knead the dough using a dough mixer with a hook attachment, but you can do it just fine with your hands (it just takes longer). Sift 550 grams of wheat flour into a suitable sized bowl, add 150 grams of sugar, 7 grams of quick-acting yeast and half a teaspoon of salt. Mix everything.

Pour 230 milliliters of warm (slightly above human body temperature) milk. The recipe uses 2.5% fat milk, but any milk will do. We break two chicken eggs (we take quite large ones — 55-60 grams each). You need three small ones.

Mix everything again so that the flour absorbs moisture. There is no need to achieve smoothness and uniformity of the dough yet. After this, gradually (in 2-3 doses) introduce 80 grams of softened butter (fat content — 82%). Not melted, but soft (2-3 hours before kneading the dough, transfer it from the refrigerator to the kitchen table).

Knead the dough with a paddle or by hand until smooth. The dough mixer will do it in 5-7 minutes, but you will have to work with your hands for about ten. The consistency should be very soft and fairly sticky.

Now divide the yeast dough in half. To one part add a tablespoon of grated orange zest (this is about one large fruit) and a teaspoon of turmeric (this is a natural yellow dye). You could do without the latter, but the color from the orange zest is not enough.

Knead the dough until it becomes homogeneous and practically does not stick to your hands. Transfer to a separate bowl.

Place the second part of the dough in the same bowl and add 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder.

Also knead until no unmixed parts (light areas) remain.

You can leave the chocolate dough in the bowl, but I decided to put the bun in a clean, smaller bowl. Cover the containers with a light towel or cling film and let it ferment for about an hour (until it doubles in volume) in a warm place. This could be an oven with a light on or a microwave off with a glass of hot water. True, it’s hardly possible to place two bowls in the microwave…

In the meantime, wash the dirty dishes and prepare the filling for layering the dough. For this we need soft butter, granulated sugar, candied orange peels and dark chocolate (you can replace it with milk, but it will make the baked goods sweeter).

Beat 100 grams of butter and 50 grams of sugar until the butter turns white and increases in volume.

We do this with a mixer with a whisk attachment for about 7-10 minutes. It is not important to achieve complete dissolution of sugar crystals.

Melt 50 grams of dark chocolate in a water bath or in the microwave in pulses (10 seconds each, so as not to overheat). Stir and then let the melted chocolate cool to a lukewarm state. Add half of the butter whipped with sugar.

Stir and place in the refrigerator until the chocolate mixture hardens slightly. The consistency should be like soft chocolate butter. 100 grams of candied orange peel should be cut as finely as possible so that they are then distributed more evenly throughout the baked goods.

When the dough has at least doubled in size, we move on to shaping future Easter cakes.

I decided to make three cruffin cakes, so I divided each type of dough into three parts. Moreover, my forms are of different sizes (all are large, one is smaller), so the cones are also different. Round the dough using additional wheat flour. I didn’t list it in the ingredients, but about 3 tablespoons is enough for the entire molding. Cover the pieces with a kitchen towel and let them sit for 10-12 minutes. During this time, the dough will relax and become more pliable.

Take a yellow bun and roll it out with a rolling pin (again, sprinkling with flour if necessary) into a thin layer. Thickness — no more than 5 millimeters.

Grease with soft butter and sugar and sprinkle with candied fruits. Do not forget that you need to visually divide the fillers into the required number of parts.

Roll out the chocolate bun in the same way and place it on top of the orange blank. We try to ensure that both layers of dough are the same size.

Brush chocolate dough with chocolate butter.

Roll both doughs and fillings into a tight roll.

Using a large knife, cut the workpiece, but not all the way. It is advisable to use a knife with a long blade and do not saw the roll, but cut it with one pressure, otherwise the layers may become smudged.

How to wrap a future cruffin cake? We wrap both ends in the form of curls so that the cut is on the side.

We take one edge of the workpiece and screw it over the second snail. In this case, the place where we did not cut the dough should be in the center of the cake. We carefully tuck the top edge inside so that the snail does not unfold later.

We transfer the workpiece into the bean box. By the way, for me this process is the most difficult and nerve-wracking. You need to take the workpiece in your hand so that the top yellow patch is in your palm, and your fingers clasp the entire height of the cake. This is why it is important not to make the workpiece too wide! We form the rest of the cakes in the same way. Regarding the bean boxes: I have detachable ones, the bottom and walls are lined with siliconized parchment paper. Dimensions: 2 blue shapes (height — 11 cm, diameter — 13 cm) and black (height — 10 cm, diameter — 11 cm). If you don’t have these, bake Easter cakes in tin cans (from pineapples, peaches, poppy seeds…). Just be sure to keep in mind that the dough will increase three times in size during baking. Allow the pieces to double in size for about one hour.

Bake chocolate-orange cakes in an oven preheated to 170 degrees for approximately 40-50 minutes. The cooking time will depend on the size of the baked goods and the features of your oven (I have an electric oven, heating — bottom + top, no convection).

Let the finished cakes cool in the molds for about ten minutes, then remove them and remove the paper. Cool the baked goods completely and decorate as desired. Store in plastic bags at room temperature.

By the way, returning to the topic of traditional cruffin cakes, I will say that I have been baking them almost every Easter for seven years now. A proven step-by-step recipe with multi-colored candied fruits is here.

One of the variations is cruffin cakes with poppy seed filling. Very juicy, tender and tasty.

And for lovers of chocolate and nuts, I have a recipe for these marble cakes.

Orange-chocolate Easter cakes (in my opinion) do not need additional decoration at all. Unless you can lightly sprinkle the caps with powdered sugar… Nastenka, thank you so much for the holiday order! Cook with pleasure, friends, happy Easter and bon appetit!