What are “gebackene Mäuse” ?!?

“Gebackene Mäuse” means translated baked mice . My fried little balls got their name because of their unique form and are very popular during the carnival season in Austria. Baked mice / donut holes are a smaller variation of our famous Austrian donuts which are also called “Krapfen” and are filled with apricot jam. Baked mice are more common on the countryside.

Traditional Austrian Donuts (Krapfen) are made of a soft yeast dough which is slightly sweetened.They then get formed into balls and afterwards fried in lard.

We have 2 dough variations in Austria on how baked mice( Austrian donut holes) get made.

The first is a classic soft yeast dough and the second is a batter made with curd cheese, flour, eggs and baking powder. Formed with 2 spoons into little dumplings and fried in oil.

Since my recipe takes only 30 minutes , my mice are made of the baking powder, curd cheese batter variation.

Austrian Donut holes with pumpkin and cardamom

Whenever we visited my grandma during the winter month she always welcomed us with baked mice. It was a tradition that we could only leave her when all the fried donut holes were gone. I mean the first batch was gone in under 15 minutes. Somehow she always managed to serve us a second batch at the end of our visit ?.

In honor of our grandma I wanted to recreate her baked mice but liked to add my personal touch to the recipe.

Lets get to the important part – the RECIPE

“Baked mice” – fried Austrian Donut holes with pumpkin and cardamom

The ingredients

• 150g cream cheese – for all Austrian people you can use curd cheese too of course
• 40g milk
• 90 g brown sugar – I just love that caramel flavor
• 80g pumpkin puree, homemade or canned
• 1 egg
• 300g all purpose flour
• 2cl cointreau
• 1/4 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 8g baking powder
• oil for frying
• Powdered sugar for sprinkling

The Instruction

• Firstly I’m starting with creaming the cream cheese, milk and sugar until pale and fluffy in a bowl of my kitchen aid with a whisk attached.
• Secondly I’m adding the egg, the cointreau and pumpkin puree and beat for 2 more minutes until homogenous.
• In a small bowl I’m mixing together the dry ingredients.
• I’m adding these to the wet batter and mix them in with a spatula. I don’t want to over beat it.
• I let the batter rest for 10 minutes.
• After the batter has rested start with heating the oil in a deep frying pan to 185 degrees Celsius or about 365 degree Fahrenheit. Use a thermometer to control the heat of the oil.
• When the oil has the right temperature start forming little round dumplings with the help of 2 spoons. the spoon is about half full .
• Drop the formed dumplings into the hot oil and fry them for a couple of minutes on both sides until golden brown.
• Put the fried donut holes on paper kitchen towels and sprinkle them with powdered sugar before serving

Why you should give this delicious donut holes recipe a try

• Firstly I love easy recipes that don’t need many ingredients.
• Secondly everybody should try from time to time recipes from other cultures. Especially sweet ones right?!??
• I love treats that can be shared with many people therefore this baked mice recipe is perfect for that.
• My family loves it when our house is smelling of sugar and freshly baked good.
• They are whipped up in no time and if there are to many just freeze them for later.
• I like that they aren’t super sweet but crispy on the outside and soft and moist on the inside.
• And lastly I think that cardamom is an underrated spice and you’ll be surprised how tasty and full of flavor the donut holes are because of the cardamom and pumpkin.
• There can never be enough pumpkin recipes for me during fall season .

These Austrian “gebackene Mäuse” (donut holes) can be enjoyed for breakfast as well as to a cup of coffee in the afternoon or bring them to a friends party. They will be the first thing gone at the cake buffet. ?

Sweet warm cardamom hugs Nina

Maybe you would like to check out these delicious recipes too:

• Soft brioche babka with blueberry vanilla filling
• Fairy Kisses – the most airy cookies ever
• Antonia’s favorite apple pie

Did you make this recipe? Great tag us on Instagram @twosisterslivinglife or use our hashtag #twosisterslivinglife so we can see. Make sure to pin our recipe for later and follow us on Pinterest

The post Baked Mice – fried Austrian no yeast donut holes with pumpkin and cardamom made in under 30 minutes appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.

This is an easy and delicious recipe for a babka bread filled with fresh strawberries and coconut .The babka is made out of a brioche dough and I added saffron for a little decadents. You are welcome . The flavors are perfect for a warm summer Sunday afternoon but it’s also perfect for the holidays as a wonderful breakfast recipe or as a filled brioche bread served with butter as an afternoon treat.

If you’d like to serve it for breakfast please prepare it the evening before and refrigerate the unbaked babka bread in the fridge until morning. Let the prepared loaf pan stand for 1 hour at a warm place so that the dough can come to room temperature.

Saffron brioche babka – The saffron isn’t a must but makes the taste definitely more complex.

As you may already discovered I already have a delicious blueberry babka recipe up on our blog but I so much love babka that I though I want to add another delicious filled sweet bread recipe. And I made that new babka extraordinary decadent just for you. I added saffron to the brioche dough and some flavorful cardamom to the filling (fresh strawberries and coconut). Best decision of my life. Please if you don’t have any saffron at home you can of course leave it out. Make the babka its delicious without the saffron of course too.

Sweet yeasty bread recipes made especially for the holidays – origin of the babka

There exist a lot of babka recipes and brioche recipes out there but what is the difference between those 2 sweet bread doughs? Or are these the same? I will tell you the difference.

Babka bread is a traditionally jewish sweet bread filled and twisted or braided. There are no specific informations about the dough. Only that it’s an enriched dough so it could also be a brioche dough recipe. So why not use a delicious buttery brioche dough to make a more special and grant babka?

Traditionally babka is made from a doubled and twisted length of yeast dough and is typically baked in a high loaf pan. Instead of a fruit filling, the dough contains cinnamon and/or chocolate. The babka is usually toppedwith streusel. Jewish immigrants brought this dish, also known as Krantz Cake to New York where it became very popular at the beginning of 2010.

Brioche dough recipes are always lightly sweetened doughs. They almost contain as much butter and eggs as a buttery cake but have a very soft and airy texture instead of a cake crumb.

The important things about making this babka recipe.

• I always proof the yeast! My yeast needs to be dissolved in WARM (38°C) milk and 1 tbsp of sugar and loosely covered with a kitchen towel or plastic wrap. The yeast is prooven when the liquid becomes foamy and bubbly.
• I measure exactly! For every recipe I make measuring my ingredients is the most important rule ever.
• The dough needs to be kneaded for about 10 minutes! I know this sounds like much but it needs to be flexible.

Almost Done! Promised.

• I let the dough rise in a warm place . Cover the bowl loosely with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel.
• My babka bread needs enough time to rise! Thats very important! The brioche dough needs to be double in size before you can work with it again.
• After spreading the filling I roll the dough into a log and chill it for about 20 minutes in the fridge. It doesn’t get that messy when the filling is set.
• Don’t cut the log all the way through.
• Before I bake the babka it needs a second rising which will last almost as long as the first one.

I want to enjoy my time with my family to the fullest . Good food definitely goes hand in hand with these special moments on a Sunday morning. My deliciously filled babka is therefore the perfect breakfast recipe. We all gather in the morning around our table and enjoy the smell of the freshly baked sweet yeasty babka. The saffron and added cardamom gives it that special complex flavor which makes it super addictive. Nobody can withstand it in my family.

Warm saffron hugs Nina

Did you make this recipe? Great tag us on Instagram @twosisterslivinglife or use our hashtag #twosisterslivinglife so we can see. Make sure to pin our recipe for later and follow us on Pinterest

I think you might be interested in these recipes too : “Blueberry vanilla Babka” or “Cinnamon Brioche Rolls with pumpkin pecan filling” .

Saffron brioche babka filled with fresh strawberries and coconut and cardamom

0 from 0 votes

Recipe by Nina Course: Bread, DessertCuisine: American, austrian, French

Servings

8

Prep time

2

hours 

Cooking time

50

minutes

Calories

536

kcal

This is an easy and delicious recipe for a babka bread filled with fresh strawberries and coconut .The babka is made out of a brioche dough and I added saffron for a little decadents and cardamom for that suptle complex taste.

Cook Mode

Keep the screen of your device on

Ingredients

• brioche dough

• 60 g 60 white sugar

• 10 g 10 freash yeast or 4g instant yeast

• 120 ml 120 milk

• 60 g 60 butter

• 350 g 350 flour cake flour or all purpose

• 2 2 egg yolks Large at room temperature

• 1/2 tsp 1/2 salt

• 1 1 egg for egg wash

• Strawberries and coconut filling

• 500 g 500 strawberries fresh

• 50 g 50 brown sugar

• 2 tbsp 2 balsamic vinegar

• 2 tbsp 2 flour

• 125 g 125 desicated coconut pan roasted until golden brown and smeels wonderfully

• 2 tsp 2 cardamom

• 100 g 100 brown sugar

• 100 ml 100 coconut milk

• 50 g 50 butter room temperature and soft

• 1/4 tsp 1/4 saffron threads

Directions

• Babka – brioche dough
• First mix warm milk (45-50 degree C) and saffron threads together and let it stand for 1 hour.Then dissolve 1 tbsp of the sugar into the warm milk. Milk should have about 37C° or 97F°.
• Add the fresh or dry yeast, stir, cover loosely with plastic wrap and let it stand for about 10 minutes or until foam and bubbles are building
• In a medium mixing bowls sift the flour and the salt and incorporate the cold butter and the rest of the sugar with a pastry cutter until everything is very fine in size.
• Add the egg yolks and the yeast mixture and mix with the hook attached on medium speed until not sticky any longer or knead everything with your hands. That's about 10-15 minutes.
• When the dough is not sticky any longer put it into an oiled bowl and cover it with plastic wrap. Let it rest at a warm place until the dough is doubled in size.That will be about 60-90 minutes depending on how warm the resting place is.
• When the dough is doubled in size put it onto your floured working surface and deflate the dough trough slapping it onto the surface 3-6 times.
• Prepare a deep loaf pan 30x12cm with butter and flour it out.
• Shape the dough loosely into a rectangular and roll it out. The shorter side of the dough should be facing you and should be as long as your loaf panThe dough should be about 1cm thick and 30×40 cm.
• Spread the coconut filling onto the dough but leave 2 cm free on the shorter side facing away from you.
• After that add the fresh strawberries on top.
• Start rolling up the dough starting from the short side facing you to the other short side.
• Put the log for fifteen minutes into th fridge so that the filling can firm up and it doesnt become such a mess.
• Remove from the fridge and use a knife to slice the log into two pieces but leave about 3 cm whole.
• Braid both strands by going over and under. Tuck the ends in and place it into the loaf pan.
• Let the dough raise one more time for about 45 minutes and brush the top with a lttle egg wash
• ***Note if you let the Babka rest in the fridge overnight it needs to rest another hour in the morning at a warm place to come to room temperature before baking.
• Strawberry and Coconut filling
• Cut the strawberries into small pieces and mix together with the 50g of sugar, flour and balsamin vinegar.
• When you dry roast the dessicated coconut until golden brown turn off the heat take the pan from the cook top. 
• Add the coconut milk, cardamom, butter and brown sugar and mix everything together with an spatula. let it rest until cool. The filling should be spreadable otherwise add a little bit more coconut milk.
• Preheat the oven to 180°Celsius or 370°Fahrenheit and bake for about 45 minutesEnjoy.

Nutrition Facts

• Calories: 536kcal
• Carbohydrates: 72g
• Protein: 8g
• Fat: 25g
• Saturated Fat: 18g
• Cholesterol: 100mg
• Sodium: 284mg
• Potassium: 302mg
• Fiber: 5g
• Sugar: 31g
• Vitamin A: 470IU
• Vitamin C: 37mg
• Calcium: 67mg
• Iron: 3mg

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The post Saffron Brioche Babka with strawberry coconut filling appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.

It’s the 7th week of self quarantine and we Austrian people are very lucky because we haven’t been hit very hard by the COVID-19 virus. The home improvement stores are already open again and with may 1st small business can open their doors again too. But why do I tell you this will you ask yourself? Well… all that time at home with nothing to do let me gain some weigh unfortunately . Thats why I started swiping the unhealthy food and treats with healthy treats and dishes. Therefore I needed a chocolatey sweet snack when my sweet tooth was calling me. Healthy brownie bliss balls were born.

Healthy chocolate brownie bliss balls with tahini and cardamom are my new favourite vegan, gluten free and dairy free treat

The chocolate bliss balls are my new favourite thing to snack on when my blood sugar is low or whenever I feel like I deserve some chocolate. What I love the most is the subtle flavour of cardamom, tahini and the tonka bean. These spices go so well with chocolate that I can’t believe I didn’t combine those flavours sooner.

Chocolatey brownie energy balls are the perfect healthy treat and so easy to make

For these vegan healthy treats you only need a blender and the ingredients of course. Even my kids love these little bites full of good ingredients.

• First you need nuts. To be honest you can use any nuts you have at home or prefer. I use a mix of cashews and other mixed nuts.
• Secondly I use pitted dates as a natural sweetener. I love the taste of them very much.
• The spices. Tonka bean and cardamom and a pinch of sea salt. When you don’t have these spices at home its all good just leave them out or use something else like cinnamon or vanilla extract.
• Nut butter. For my recipe I use of course tahini as one part and another nut butter like peanut butter or almond butter for example.
• At last the coconut milk. You can swipe the coconut milk for any other plant based milk of course.
• Unsweetened cocoa powder: the cocoa powder is for the chocolate flavour and to cover the bliss balls.

Please make sure to rate the recipe and leave us some kind words <3 . We would love for you to tag us on Instagram or Facebook when you tried one of our recipes so that we can see. nothing makes us more happy.

Save the recipe for later or pin it to your Pinterest board. We are pinners.

Sweet healthy chocolatey hugs Nina <3

If you like the recipe you may wanna give Antonia’s back to school granola bars a try.

Vegan Brownie Bliss Balls with Tahini and Cardamon

5 from 11 votes

Recipe by Nina Course: Dessert, SnackCuisine: healthy, healthy snack

Servings

30

pieces

Prep time

30

minutes

Cooking time

0

minutes

Calories

66

kcal

Total time

1

hour 

These little healhty treats are the perfect sweet snack for the whole family. They are easy to make and the tahin and cardamom give them a unique and iresistible taste. It will be hard to stop snacking on them.

Cook Mode

Keep the screen of your device on

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup 1/2 cashews

• 1/2 cup 1/2 mixed nuts

• 2 cups 2 dates pitted

• 1 tbsp 1 tahini

• 1 tbsp 1 nut butter peanut for example

• 1 tsp 1 cardamom

• 1 tsp 1 tonka bean grated, you can use vanilla extract instead too

• 3 tbsp 3 unsweetened cocoa powder

• 1/2 tsp 1/2 sea salt

• 2 tbsp 2 coconut milk

• 1 tbsp 1 dessicated coconut

• 1/2 cup 1/2 unsweetened cocoa powder for coating

Directions

• Soak the nuts for 2 hours in warm water.
• Drain the nuts and put them with all the other ingredients but the half cup of cocoa for coating, into a blender.
• Blend everything until smooth.
• Put the batter into a bowl cover it and let it rest for 1 hour in the fridge.
• Form little balls about the size of 1/2 a tbsp and roll them in the reserved unsweetened cocoa powder.
• You can keep the energy balls up to 2 weeks in an airtight container in your fridge.´
• Happy snacking <3.

Nutrition Facts

• Calories: 66kcal
• Carbohydrates: 10g
• Protein: 2g
• Fat: 3g
• Saturated Fat: 1g
• Sodium: 41mg
• Potassium: 129mg
• Fiber: 2g
• Sugar: 6g
• Vitamin C: 1mg
• Calcium: 11mg
• Iron: 1mg

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The post Healthy brownie bliss balls with tahini and cardamom appeared first on Two Sisters Living Life.