Whilst thumbing the pages of New York Cult Recipes by Marc Grossman I stumbled across a recipe for Chocolate Babka. This is a breakfast cake popular in Jewish New York bakeries and Deli’s. A hybrid between bread, brioche and cake with lots of added chocolate. What’s not to love!
The ingredients are simple and easy to come by. You need a bit of time for the dough to rise twice but not many other tricky skills. So here is the recipe from the book and my experience of making and eating Chocolate Babka.
Chocolate Babka
Ingredients
For the dough:
330g plain white flour
3/4 teaspoon dried yeast
2 pinches of salt
50g caster sugar
90ml lukewarm buttermilk
1 whole egg and 1 egg yolk (keep the spare egg white in a safe place for later)
125g melted unsalted butter
For the Streusel:
50g plain white flour
55g caster sugar
35g softened unsalted butter
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
25 dark chocolate chips
For the filling:
40g cocoa powder
125g caster sugar
2 teaspoons of vanilla sugar (I used some vanilla bean paste instead)
100g softened unsalted butter
Method
Combine all the dry dough ingredients. Beat together all the wet dough 
ingredients (except the spare egg white). Combine the two mixtures together and knead together for 5-10 minutes in an electric mixer with a dough hook. Or by hand for 10-20 minute. Form into a dough ball. Place in a lightly oiled bowl and cover with cling film. Let it rise at room temperature for 90 minutes or until it has doubled in size. Mine took about 2 hours to rise until doubled in size so be prepared to be patient.
Whilst the dough is rising, prepare the Streusel. Mix all the streusel ingredients 
together by hand until it is crumbly. Set aside in the fridge until later.
Shaping the dough
When the dough ball has doubled in size lightly flour a large workspace to 
begin shaping the dough.
First roll out the dough into a rectangle approximately 40cm long.
Combine together all the filling ingredients except the butter.
Spread the melted butter over the rolled out dough. Next sprinkle over the other filling ingredients.
Roll the dough up along its long edge.
Bring the two open ends together and tightly twist the dough three times.
Line a 9 inch/21cm rectangular loaf tin and place the dough in the tin.
Cover loosely with cling film and leave to rise for 1 hour at room temperature.
Pre heat the oven to 180c fan.
After the dough has rise, lightly whisk the egg white and brush over the top of the dough.
Next cover the top of the loaf with the streusel mixture.
Bake in the oven for 45 minutes until the top is golden brown.
Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin for 20 minutes. If you try to remove it too soon the streusel falls off.
Slice and enjoy your freshly made Chocolate Babka.
It was too sweet for me at breakfast time but was lovely with a cup of coffee later in the day. Very unusual with the streusel topping but very nice. Doesn’t quite replace breakfast or a cake for me but so glad I made it as it was very tasty and chocolatey!
