Potica

Slovenia is a country that I low-key had barely even heard of. When I discovered that my Papa was part Slovenian I was very excited to learn a little more about it (and their food). As I said in my previous post where I made Hiddeg Meggyleves, my Papa was the most quiet guy I’ve ever met. I didn’t know a thing about him other than the fact that he gave great hugs and was always giving me ice cream.

Slovenia seemed to share a lot of similar dishes with Hungary and other surrounding countries since it is historically a crossroads. I thought there was no way I’d learn anything surprising about my heritage, but here we are! I definitely thought I was just a boring white girl, but I think my heritage is actually pretty cool. I mean, I could still be a boring white girl depending on who you ask.

Potica (Poh-TEET-sah), or Slovenian nut-roll, is a dish/cake traditionally baked for special occasions like Christmas, Easter, birthdays, and weddings. It’s a light brioche dough filled with a rich tasty filling according to Jernej Kitchen. It is traditionally made with nut filling, but other popular ones are poppyseed, cottage cheese, hazelnut, chocolate, tarragon, leek, honey, and carob fillings. Let me tell you, this bad boy was very tasty and made my whole apartment smell amazing. Now let’s get into baking it!

Baking! (or trying to)

I have a confession, this is the second time I’ve baked. Ever. Unless you count box brownies, and I’m not even great at making those. The first time was actually for a bake-off at my engineering internship last summer where I baked a s’mores cheesecake and won a $25 amazon gift card, so I’m basically a professional now. Speaking of being a professional, I finally upgraded and bought a hand mixer, a rolling pin, and a flour sifter!

The recipe that I used was from the Slovene National Benefit Society. I had to cut the recipe in half, though, since it made five 9″ x 5″ loaves. That’s a bit much for just me and my fiance! I also had to sub instant yeast for cake yeast because we’re in a pandemic and everyone had decided to take up baking as a hobby (the store are all out of yeast).

Now, step 1! You need to mix your yeast and let it rise. Stir it with warm milk and sugar until the sugar dissolves. This is where I subbed in instant yeast. I found online that you can sub 2 1/4 tsp of instant yeast for every ounce of cake yeast, so that is what I did. You’re also supposed to let your yeast rise for ~10 minutes, but during this time I discovered that I was out of sugar for the rest of the recipe and had to go to the store real quick to get more. I’d say my yeast sat for at least 20-30 minutes and I don’t know if that matters because I don’t know anything about baking!

Next up is making the dough. I first had to “scald” milk in a pot. Cut to me googling how to scald milk; I still don’t exactly know, but you heat it until little bubbles and steam come from just around the edges. Then add butter, let it melt, then set aside to cool. In a separate bowl, beat egg yolks, salt, sugar, and vanilla until “lemon colored.” Finally, sift 1-2 cups (for 1/2 recipe) into a bowl and combine everything; milk mixture, egg yolk mixture, and yeast. Beat it all with your electric mixer and just keep adding flour until the dough can be handled without sticking. You can use a wooden spoon to mix in the flour after the dough gets too thick for the mixer, or if your mixer has little bread hooks like mine, you can use that! I was a little quick to try and grab the dough and got my hands coated in a sticky mess, so don’t do that. Knead the dough for 15 minutes and then place it in an oiled bowl to rise. It needs to rise for ~2 hours or until doubled in size.

Time to make the tasty walnut filling. The hardest step to do without a food processor is up first: grinding up the walnuts. I almost threw in the towel on this part, but if you do have a food processor, this would be a piece of cake (or maybe a piece of potica??). Anyway, grind up your walnuts as best and as fine as you can, then, if your blender sucks, dump it all onto a cutting board and use a potato masher to get the bigger chunks. Set aside the walnuts and in a sauce pan melt the butter. add milk, honey, and sugar, bring the mixture to a boil, and then pour the hot mixture over the crushed walnuts. Add vanilla and grated orange peel, mix, and allow to cool. I would say I probably added a bit too much orange peel; The recipe calls for the grated peel of 1/2 an orange, but I bought a REALLY big orange. Maybe go easy on the orange peel unless you want a very citrus-y flavor. The last step for the filling is to beat the egg whites until they’re stiff and then fold them into the cooled mixture.

Now you roll the dough out and dump the nut filling onto it. The original recipe said to roll it out to a “50 x 32 inch” rectangle, so I just kind of rolled it out to however big I wanted. The part where I roll up the mixture probably would have gone a bit smoother if my dough looked more like a rectangle and less like an egg, but oh well. Don’t forget to sprinkle on some cinnamon before rolling it up!

The directions say to start rolling from the long side, but for some reason I aparently liked the idea of rolling from the short side (?). You’re also supposed to prick the dough every roll to release any air pockets, but I did not do that either. I really just winged this step and rolled it to the best of my ability.

FINALLY YOU ARE DONE. Cut that dough log to the size of your (greased) pans, slap them in there, and cover them and let them rise for another hour. Bake in a 325 degree (Fahrenheit) oven for 1 hour and violá she’s done. Nice and golden brown and delicious.

How’d it Taste?

Sweet and delicious and with a great texture; I think I nailed it if I do say so myself. Mine actually tasted VERY orange-y, which I don’t personally mind, but I’m not sure if that’s what the recipe was going for. I can definitely see how the orange would balance out the other flavors, but it stood out a lot in my potica. Maybe buy an orange that isn’t the size of your head and you should be fine to follow the recipe as is. I think I will definitely be trying this recipe again for our next Christmas since that’s a holiday potica is traditionally made on. All in all, if you have the proper tools to make this, it’s actually pretty easy, and if you don’t…well…you may end up getting your spoon chipped up in the blender blade trying to push those walnuts down.

The Recipe (cut in 1/2)

Ingredients

Yeast:
1/2 large cake compressed yeast (1oz.) – I subbed this for 2 1/4 tsp instant yeast
1/4 cup lukewarm milk
1-1/2 tsp sugar

Dough:
3/4 cups milk
6 tbsp butter
3 egg yolks
6 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1-1/2 tsp vanilla
3-1/2 to 4 cups all-purpose flour (sifted)

Walnut Filling:
1 pound walnuts (ground fine)
1/2 stick butter
3/4 cups milk or half and half cream
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup honey
1-1/2 tsp vanilla
Grated peel from 1/2 orange or 1/2 lemon
3 egg whites
Cinnamon

Directions

1. Dissolve yeast in milk; add sugar and combine.
2. Cover and let rise in warm place, about 10 minutes.
3. Scald milk in sauce pan; add butter. Cool to lukewarm.
4. In small electric mixer bowl, beat egg yolks, sugar, salt and vanilla until lemon-colored.
5. In large bowl, sift 1-2 cups flour.
6. Pour mixtures of prepared yeast, milk, butter, eggs and sugar into mixing bowl with 3 cups of flour; beat with electric mixer until smooth and elastic.
7. Keep adding flour and mixing with a wooden spoon until of consistency that dough can be handled without sticking.
8. Place on floured board and knead for about 15 minutes, adding flour as needed, to make a non-sticking dough.
9. Place dough in well-greased bowl; turn to grease top.
10. Cover and let rise in warm place for about 2 hours until double in bulk.
11. Grind walnuts in food chopper with finest blade.
12. Melt butter in large saucepan.
13. Add milk, sugar and honey; cook to rolling boil, taking care not to let it boil over.
14. Pour hot mixture over walnuts. Add vanilla and grated peel. Mix thoroughly and allow to cool.
15. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold into the cooled nut mixture.
16. Grease well the loaf pans.
17. Roll out dough on table, sprinkled well with flour.
18. Spread cooled filling evenly over entire dough, sprinkling generously with cinnamon. (If desired, raisins may be added at this point.)
19. Start rolling up dough by hand from the wide side, stretching the dough slightly with each roll. Keep the side edges as even as possible. Prick roll about every several turns with a thin knitting needle or cake tester to help eliminate air pockets.
20. With edge of flat plate, cut desired lengths. Seal ends more securely by gently pulling dough down to cover ends and tucking underneath when placing in pan.
21. Cover and let rise in warm place until double, about one hour.
22. Bake in preheated 325-degree oven for 1 hour until medium brown.
23. If a glossy top is desired, brush each loaf with 1 egg yolk beaten with 1 tablespoon milk 15 minutes before potica is done.