Kringle

Yes, it is funny that this is the post just following my "lose weight" post, but I promise I haven't made this since Christmas. Kringle, or kringla as it's called in Iceland is a Scandinavian dessert said to have been greatly influenced by Austrian bakers who "filled in" during worker strikes in Sweden. I don't doubt it, Austrians are some of the world's best bakers, pastry-makers, and confection makers, in my opinion. In Sweden you always make kringle in the shape of a pretzel (the symbol for bakery), but my ancestry is Danish and my husband's Icelandic, to say nothing of the fact that we are rogue Americans who do whatever works for us. I think the traditional versions take forever to make, but anyone can make this recipe, and it produces a flaky and impressive filled pastry. The key is to chill the dough because it's almost like a batter, not a dough, at room temperature. Even after it has been chilled, the dough is very sticky and you have to work quickly so you don't warm it up too much. My fool-proof method for this is to flour a piece of foil-paper and roll it out on that -- no stick and easy clean up.

Pastry Ingredients:
2 C flour
2 sticks butter (room temp)
1 (8-oz) tub of sour cream
1/2 cup to 3/4 cup jam or preserve for filling
1 egg white
1 egg yolk beaten w/1 tsp almond extract or water

Almond Buttercream Frosting Ingredients
2 TBS softened butter
2 TBS softened cream cheese
1 cup or so powdered sugar
1/2 tsp almond extract
milk as needed

Directions:
1. Mix flour and butter as for pie crust (criss-cross with 2 butter knives or beat on slow with handmixer.
2. Add sour cream; form into ball. It will be very wet. Dust with flour and place in plastic bag.
3. Refrigerate 4 hours or overnight.
4. Roll on floured foil into a large rectangle or if you don't have a large cookie sheet, you can divide this into three rectangles.
5. Brush with egg white and visualize the rectangle as 3 equal parts -- spread preserve down middle avoiding the top and bottom edge by an inch.
6. Fold the two outer sides in one on top of the other. Pinch ends and press in center fold. Transfer to cookie sheet.
7. Brush top with egg yolk mixture.
8. Bake on ungreased cookie sheet at 350 for 40 minutes or golden brown.
9. Beat all buttercream frosting ingredients together to make a thick frosting.
10. Cool (you can have it still slightly warm -- just not hot) and frost with butter cream icing; slice for serving.