How to Bake a Delicious Poppy Seed Stollen | Recipe

You want to bake a poppy seed stollen? This Silesian family recipe is easy to make and tastes simply delicious. 1,000 times better than bought ready-made stollen – it’s worth baking yourself!

A Christmas tree with real candles, Erzgebirge pyramids and incense burners, mistletoe over the front door – some things are simply part of Christmas. For everyone it can be something else that they don’t want to do without at Christmas time. Mostly it has to do with childhood memories: subconsciously, the turned wooden angel figures, the smell of fir branches and burning candles and the taste of home-baked poppy seed stollen remind us of childhood Christmases. Back then, when you could hardly sleep for days beforehand because of the excitement of what presents you would get….

At least that’s how I feel! One of the things I absolutely cannot do without at Christmas is juicy homemade poppy seed stollen! The purest rush of happiness and no, don’t worry: we don’t use opium poppies for it in our family…. 😉

The classic Christmas stollen is made with sultanas, best known in the form as Dresdener Christstollen.  But we always baked poppy seed stollen, perhaps because my father comes from Silesia, which is where this variety comes from. I like poppy seed stollen better than any other stollen. A big advantage of making it yourself is that you don’t have to store it for a long time, like other types of Stollen, but on the contrary, it’s best to prepare it fresh and eat it the next few days. Then it is really juicy. An ideal recipe, therefore, for all those who have time to bake just before the holidays and want to serve their loved ones something really delicious for coffee at Christmas.

Bake Your Own Silesian Poppy Seed Stollen – Our Family Recipe

Ingredients (makes 1 large or 2 medium poppy seed stollen)

For the Dough

• 600 g flour
• 250 ml milk
• 20 g yeast, fresh (½ cube)
• 75 g sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 egg yolk
• 100 g butter
• 1 organic lemon (grated zest) or 1 packet of lemon zest flavouring

For the Filling

• 500 g poppy seeds, ground
• 200 ml milk
• 200 g sugar
• 1 pck. vanilla sugar
• ½ tsp cinnamon
• 50 g butter
• 200 g sultanas (unsulphured)
• 50 g chopped almonds
• 1 tbsp rum
• 1 egg white

For Decorating (if necessary)

• 75 g icing sugar (sifted)
• 1 tbsp lemon juice

Preparation

Step 1: Make Yeast Dough

The first step is to make a yeast dough: sift the flour into a large bowl and make a well. Then warm the milk. Crumble the yeast into another small bowl, add a pinch of sugar and a teaspoon of salt, then pour some of the warm milk over it. Stir well until the yeast dissolves. Then pour the liquid into the flour well in the large bowl, cover with flour and leave to rise for approx. 20 min. at room temperature.

You can see that you can continue when the flour cover has become very cracked. Then you can add the remaining milk, one egg yolk, the sugar and the grated lemon zest and knead the yeast dough by hand until you get a smooth homogeneous dough. Now cover with a kitchen towel and let it rise at room temperature for another hour.

Step 2: Mix the Poppy Seed Filling & Shape the Stollen

For the poppy seed filling, scald the poppy seeds with boiling milk and mix in all the other ingredients for the filling. The filling must then swell for approx. 30 min.

Now knead the yeast dough again and roll it out into a large rectangle. (I made two of them.) Spread the poppy seed filling evenly on top, but leave about 2 cm of border free. Then roll up the coated dough and shape it into stollen shapes. Place on a greased baking tray and leave to rise again for 1 hour.

Step 3: Bake

Bake in the preheated oven (with top/bottom heat: at 180 degrees on the lowest rack, with fan oven: 150 degrees on the 2nd rack from the bottom) for approx. 40 min.

Step 4: Decorate (optional)

After the poppy seed cake has cooled, you can dust it thickly with icing sugar or coat it with icing. For the icing, simply mix the icing sugar with the lemon juice until you have a thick mixture and spread it over the stollen. This gives the Stollen its characteristic white appearance, because traditionally its appearance is supposed to be reminiscent of the Christ child wrapped in swaddling clothes. For me, however, this version is a little too sweet, as there is already enough sugar in the dough. You can also leave out the icing, or like me, simply dust the plate with icing sugar when serving. Looks beautiful and tastes good! 🙂
Preparation time: approx. 30 min.

Baking time: approx. 40 min.

Resting time: approx. 2 hours.

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I hope you enjoy the homemade poppy seed stollen as much as I do and that it sweetens your Christmas days! If you’re looking for more recipes for Christmas biscuits, check out our top 10 recipes for Christmas cookie recipes and more cookie recipes. All year round, you’ll find insprition for activities with kids, friends and your partner on our website. Check it out.

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