Most Eastern European households have a recipe for a sweet eggy bread made at Easter. This is my family's version - a sweet nutmeg and lemon scented bread with a toothsome softness.
The glory of this bread, of course, is its vast size - nearly 2 feet long! - and beautiful braiding. It looks complicated but it's truly not difficult at all. It makes a spectacular holiday centerpiece, and the sweet, moist flavor is indescribable. Read on for the recipe and more photos of braiding the bread...
The official recipe follows, but here's the general steps, since it does look pretty overwhelming at first.
1. Make the sweet dough and let it rise until doubled.
2. Roll out and divide into strips and braid the first four into the bottom layer.
3. Braid the next three and place on top.
4. Twist the last two on top. Brush the whole thing with egg yolk and sprinkle almonds on top.
5. Bake!
Houska
makes one very large loaf
8 cups flour
1/2 pound unsalted butter
2 packages (0.25 oz. each) yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup cream
2 cups milk, scalded and cooled to lukewarm
1 cup sugar (less 1 tablespoon)
1 tablespoon salt
2 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
1 cup chopped blanched almonds
1 cup golden raisins, plumped in warm water and drained well
2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
1 teaspoon nutmeg
Extra beaten egg yolk
Slivered almonds, for garnish
Work butter into flour with your fingers until well combined.
Put yeast, sugar & sweet cream together in a separate bowl. Let stand for about five minutes or until it gets bubbly.
Mix the milk, extra sugar and salt and stir well. Beat eggs until light. Add the milk, and then the yeast mixture. Beat in the flour mixture, stirring at the end. Add almonds, raisins, and lemon rind.
Knead thoroughly 15-20 minutes. Cover and let rise for two hours or until doubled in size. Punch down and shape into smooth round ball.
Roll out 9 strips, each 18 inches long. Braid four for the bottom row, then three on top of of that, and twist the last two strips on top. Place on a lightly greased sheet and brush with beaten yolk and sprinkle chopped almonds on top.
Let rise for 1 hour.
Bake at 350ºF for 30 minutes, then lower temperatore to 250ºF and bake for another 30 minutes.
Let cool before slicing.
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It looks just like challah to me. But as soon as Passover is done, I'm going to run to the kitchen and try this version out.
That looks delicious! Thanks for sharing the recipe; I think I'll try it on Sunday.
where did the nutmeg go?
Yum!!! Can't wait to make this.
little corection, this is not houska but VANOCKA, and baked specialy on christmas. Houska is the same chape and only one layer, small savory bread about 5 inch long.
It's also very similar to my family's Polish babka. Like Faith said, most eastern european households enjoy some variety of this bread at the holidays. I think sometimes even within the same nationality the names, shapes, etc, get changed around over the years. My families "poppy seed bread" is like that.
My straight-from-Poland roommate laughed at me for calling it poppy seed "bread", because to her it was a cake called makowiec.
Now, a Hungarian store near where I live makes something very similar but shaped slightly differently called cozonac.
Personally, I don't care what its called or how its shaped so long as it tastes good.
I think there is something missing here. I am making the bread, but the recipe says to "work butter into flour with fingers." Should it be melted? With 8 cups of flour, this seems very strange and laborious. Also, it doesn't say to put a warm liquid with the yeast, which is fundamental to activating yeast. I ended up rearranging the instructions, melting the butter to add to other liquid ingredients, and putting warm milk in the yeast. I'm not done yet, so I can't say how it turned out, but maybe the poster could double-check that it is all written as it should be.
@Ariana M. a late reply, but a couple answers:
- The butter should be very soft and you simply rub it into the dough, as if you were making biscuits. (Except of course here the butter is much softer than if you were making biscuits.)
- You don't need a warm liquid to activate yeast. In fact, a lot of people kill their yeast, thinking that they need hot liquid. I do proof the yeast here, but the cream doesn't need to be warmed.
This looks just like my grandmother's Christmas Houska, except she added candied fruit. I never heard it called Vanoka. She was 100% Czech - parents came from the old country. It is all very interesting.
I'm in the same position as @SandyFromNebraska. My grandma makes a couple loaves of Christmas Houska every year with some green and read candied fruit. She also always puts anise in. According to her, there is the anise style and then the one here made with citrus for flavoring.
It makes the best toast, all you need is a little butter and you're in heaven!
I am a Czech who immigrated to Canada as a child with my family. My mother makes Vanocka every Christmas...as pictured above. For Easter the form of the dough is modified. It is shaped into an oval, not braided and is then called a bochánek. So delicious :)
My mom and grandmother from CZ always made this with anise, raisins and almonds. I don't see as many recipes calling for the anise. Must be the style you refer too. It's delicious, especially toasted!
Hi, Great recipe but this is not houska -- houska is a small braided, savory bread roll. The bread you've pictured here is called Vánočka (vanocka), which is a sweet, raisin, and almond topped, braided loaf similar to brioche and challah. It is found and eaten year long but it's not an Easter bread but rather a traditional Christmas bread. The name comes from the Czech and Slovak words for Christmas.
The traditional Czech Easter bread is called Mazanec. The vanocka and mazanec recipes are somewhat similar to each other, but the Easter bread shape is round and not braided.
I was looking for a good recipe for Italian pannettone (sp?) and this looked to be very close to that, though in a braided form. Since it makes a HUGE loaf I cut the recipe in half for my family of three. THIS IS A FABULOUS BREAD!!!!! Don't hesitate to try it!!
From an amateur bread baker of twenty years