Du you already have a plan for breakfast during the holidays? I prefer baking the one or other  overnight recipe where either the dough rise over night or the already shape rolls. And during the holidays I love everything which is made with sweet brioche dough. But the high butter amount in this dough get solid in the fridge and hinder the dough to rise properly. A solution for this problem is using cream as liquid in the dough. That adds enough fat to make the crumb soft but will not keep the dough from rising.

This Sunday I made a test run and baked already my Christmas wreath. It is made with sweet Starter (if you have no sweet Starter please refer to the Biga recipe at the end of the recipe as replacement) and some cream makes its crumb nicely soft. The segments of the wreath are formed by dough “roses” made of four circles each. I saw this idea somewhere in the internet some time ago but I did not save the site. But luckily it worked with the facts I still had in mind.

As finish I glazed the dough with a cooked sugar glaze. A sweet bread with sugar glaze is somehow essential for my Christmas breakfast!

Christmas Wreath

yields 1 wreath

Sweet Starter

• 100g flour Type 550
• 100g sweet Starter
• 50g Water

Teig

• Sweet Starter
• 335g flour Type 550
• 200g cream
• 15g Water (if needed)
• 40g egg yolk (from 2 eggs size M)
• 10g fresh yeast
• 5g Salt
• grated peel of 1/5 Orange
• seeds of 1/2 Vanilleschote
• 70g sugar

Glazing

• 1 Egg

Sugar-Glaze

• 50g sugar
• 35g Water
• seeds of 1/2 Vanilleschote

Mix the ingredients of the sweet starter and let it rise for 4 hours at 30°C.

Knead all ingredients except sugar and butter for 5 min at slow speed. Then knead 7 min at fast speed. Now add the sugar in small increments and knead until the sugar is incooperated before adding the next sugar. At last add the butter all at once. Knead to full gluten development.

Let rise for one hour.

Line a springform (Diameter: 26cm ) with baking paper. To ensure that the whole in the middle of the wreath will be there after baking as well place a cooking ring (Diameter: 7.5 cm )

Now flatten the dough into 0.4 cm thickness and cut out 12 circles of 10-12 cm Diameter (I used a dessert bowl for that). Lay four circles on each other, so that they are overlapping the other and roll them to a log beginning with the circle on the bottom of the stack (see picture). Cut it in half with a dough scrapper. Place the roses in the springform with some space between them.

Proof overnight in the fridge.

The next morning heat the oven to 200°C. Brush the wreath with egg and bake for about 35-40 min with steam.

In the meantime prepare the sugar glaze: bring water, seeds of the vanilla bean and sugar to boil and boil until the sugar syrup form threads when it drops from the spoon. Brush the still hot wreath thinly with the syrup.