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Roscón de Reyes recipe

Claire Maguire Profile Image

Claire Maguire

Sawday's Expert

5 min read

Joana from Sa Rota d’en Palerm shares a recipe for Roscón de Reyes, a traditional Spanish Christmas cake whose origins date back to the pre-Roman era. It originally included a bean inside as a symbol of prosperity. Although the Roscón de Reyes was already known in Spain, it was Felipe V who introduced the method of including a coin in the dough as a prize. This eventually changed to a ceramic figurine, while the bean became a negative symbol. Tradition states that whoever finds the figurine will be crowned king, and whoever finds the bean will have to bring the roscón next year.

 

 

Photo courtesy of @ol_guita

Ingredients

For the dough:
650g flour
250ml warm milk
25-30g fresh yeast
120g sugar
120g melted butter
2 whole eggs and 1 egg yolk
10 g of salt
2 and 1/2 tablespoons of orange blossom water
Grated peel of 1 lemon and 1 orange

To decorate:
Candied fruit
Icing sugar
Sliced almonds
1 beaten egg
Bakeable figurine

 

Method

1. Mix some of the 250 ml of warm milk with 2 or 3 spoonfuls of the flour. Add 25-30 g of fresh crumbled yeast and stir everything. Cover, leave in a warm place and let it ferment for 15 or 20 minutes.
2. In a large bowl add the rest of the flour and gradually add the remaining ingredients: sugar, lemon and orange rind, salt, milk, 2 eggs, the starter dough, orange blossom water and finally the melted butter. Stir until you get a homogeneous dough.
3. Flour a smooth surface, and knead it for a few minutes with your hands. If necessary, add a little more flour in order to work the dough well.
4. Shape the dough into a ball, and once it is well kneaded, keep it covered with a damp cloth for a couple of hours in a warm place.
5. After a couple of hours the dough should have grown approximately twice as much. Take it out of the container and on a smooth floured surface, knead it again. Little by little, shape your doughnut. The hole will get smaller when baking, so it is best to make it big.
6. Let it rest again for about an hour, well covered and in a warm place. A good trick is to heat the oven to 50°C, turn it off and then put the roscón in to keep it warm.
7. Paint the roscón with egg and decorate it – we recommend candied fruit, sliced almonds and icing sugar.
8. Hide the figurine and the bean.
9. Once the roscón is decorated, put it back in the oven and bake at 180°C for about 20 minutes.

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Claire Maguire

Sawday's Expert

Claire combines her twin loves of writing and travel to create interesting and inspiring blog content. Originally from Ireland, she spent a lot of time in coastal Donegal, so visiting anywhere by the sea brings a special kind of happiness and nostalgia. Her favourite sort of place is anything that makes her say “I wish I lived here!” and as a big foodie, she sees time away as a period of no-holds-barred eating and drinking against a picturesque backdrop.
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