Kugelhopf Surprise
By: sean sullivan
Published: Sunday, May 16, 2010 - 6:38am

Ingredients




Kugelhopf au Lard 

 all-purpose white flour
1/4 ounce rapid rise dry yeast
1 teaspoon salt
10 teaspoons unsalted butter at room temperature
3 eggs
7 ounces milk (just shy of a full cup)
1/4 pound finely diced bacon
1 small onion, finely diced
12 walnut halves to decorate the crown of the loaf
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
Creating the Kugelhopf Surprise

5 ounces cream cheese with garlic and herbs, I use the Boursin br
1 cup sour cream, creme fraiche or quark if you can find it
3 teaspoons finely chopped capers
1 pound thinly sliced smoked salmon -- ask for the smokiest, strongest flavor
1 hot-house/English cucumber

Preparation

1 MAKE THE KUGELHOPF AU LARD 2 In a stand mixer blend together  flour, yeast and salt. 3 Add the butter, bash it around until evenly distributed. 4 Mix the eggs with a fork and add them. 5 Slowly pour in the milk. It will be soft and sticky. 6 Knead thoroughly for 10 minutes. 7 It will pull away from the sides of the bowl. 8 Cover bowl with a dishtowel, let rise until double in volume 9 Meanwhile over low heat sweat the bacon, do brown or crisp. 10 Remove bacon, in remaining fat slowly cook onions 'til translucent 11 Grease a Kugelhopf pan well 12 Place a walnut half in each of the runnels at the bottom of the pan. 13 Knock down the dough, work in the bacon, onions and chopped walnuts Turn out dough into Kugelhopf pan. 14 Cover, let rise until it climbs above the rim of the pan. 15 Bake at 400 degrees 45 minutes. Loaf will sound hollow when tapped. 16 Turn onto a rack, let cool a bit, then remove from the pan. 17 Keep at room temp until ready for phase 2. 18 MAKE THE SURPRISE: 19 With a good serrated bread knife, take a thin slice off the top of the loaf 20 Slice loaf thinly into 10 more rings 21 Keep track of smallest at top to the largest, leaving a last ring for a base. 22 Mix the herbed cheese, the sour cream and chopped capers. 23 Slice the cucumber on the thin blade of a food processor. 24 Spread the cheese on one of each pair of slices. 25 Top with salmon, then cucumber slices. 26 Use dabs cheese mix to dot cucumbers so they will grip the bread tops. Make five sandwich rings. 27 Place the base on a serving plate. 28 Starting with largest ring, slice evenly into eight wedges. 29 Transfer sliced ring onto base. 30 Continue slicing and stacking until you have rebuilt Kugelhopf. 31 Place the nutty crown on top. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

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