DANISH PASTRY DOUGH
By Gloria Pitzer, as seen in… Gloria Pitzer’s Cookbook – Best Of The Recipe Detective (Balboa Press; Jan. 2018, p. 155). [A revised reprint of Gloria Pitzer’s Better Cookery Cookbook (Secret RecipesTM, St. Clair, MI; May 1983, 3rd Edition).]
This is the basic recipe for dough that can become coffeecake, Hawaiian bread, sweet rolls and other good things with just a twist of the wrist, some peace and quiet in the kitchen and a little know-how!
INGREDIENTS:
2 envelopes dry yeast
½ cup lukewarm water
1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup warm milk
½ cup butter (¼ pound or one stick)
2/3 cup sugar
5 cups flour
1 tablespoon vanilla or almond extract
½ teaspoon salt
2 eggs
INSTRUCTIONS:
Soften yeast in the half cup warm water. Stir in the 1 teaspoon sugar and let it stand for 5 or 6 minutes until it is quite bubbly. Place the warm milk and remaining sugar with only 2 cups of the flour in a bowl, beating to a smooth batter. Beat in the vanilla, salt and eggs; and then, the yeast mixture.
Gradually, work in remaining flour until you have a soft dough. Knead it in the bowl with lightly floured hands until dough is no longer sticky, adding only that much flour as is necessary to make the dough nice and smooth and elastic in texture.
Transfer dough to a greased bowl, turning the dough once to grease what is the top of it. Cover it loosely in a sheet of plastic kitchen rap with one side sprayed in Pam and placed that-side-down over the dough, letting it rise for 90 minutes or until doubled in bulk. Punch it down and let it rise again. Then you are free to shape it and bake it accordingly.
You can bake it up as 2 loaves of bread by splitting it in half and shaping the halves to fit neatly into 2 greased 9-inch bread loaf pans. Let them rise until doubled in size and bake, putting them into a COLD oven and setting the temperature at 450°F for 8 minutes.
At once, turn temperature down to 350°F and allow it to bake for 40 minutes or until golden brown and crust makes a hollow sound when you tap it with your finger. Remove from pans at once and let bread cool on their sides. This bread slices best the 2nd day – or, at least, after several hours of cooling!
Makes 2 small loaves. You can use disposable foil bread pans for baking, placing these on a cookie sheet. Wrap and freeze, to be used within 3 months.
See also…
