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Chocolate, Hazelnut & Pear Babka
Author: Claudia Brick
Ingredients
Babka Dough
  • 95 g butter
  • 185 ml milk (3/4 cup)
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons active dried yeast
  • 1 large egg
  • 3 tablespoons caster sugar
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 335 g high grade flour (strong flour)
Chocolate Filling
  • 90 g butter cubed
  • 2/3 cup caster sugar
  • 85 g dark chocolate
  • 1/4 cup dutch cocoa
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup hazelnuts, roasted and roughly chopped
  • 1 pear unripe (I used beurre bosc), peeled and diced small
Sugar Syrup
  • 60 g caster sugar
  • 1/4 cup water
Instructions
Babka Dough

  1. Melt the butter in a small pot over low heat. Turn off the heat, add the milk and stir to combine. Check it isn’t too hot (you want it luke warm, like body temperature), then sprinkle the active dried yeast over the top. (If this is too hot is can kill the yeast). Leave for a few minutes.

  2. In the bowl of a stand mixer or the bowl you re going to make the babka in, whisk together the egg and caster sugar to combine.

  3. Add the flour and the milk/yeast mixture to the mixing bowl and use the dough hook to knead for 5-7 minutes, until the dough is elastic, smooth and pulls away from the side of the bowl. You can also do this by hand - start off with a spoon because it is a very sticky dough, and it will probably to take closer to 10 minutes.

  4. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.
Chocolate filling
  1. Combine the butter and caster sugar in a pot over medium heat until fully melted and combined. Add the roughly chopped chocolate and stir until melted through.
  2. Add the salt and cocoa and stir to combine.

  3. Leave to cool to room temperature.

To fill:

  1. Grease and line a 9x4inch (approx 23 x 10 cm) loaf pan.

  2. On a floured surface, roll out the babka dough to a rectangle roughly 30 x 40 cm. Try to make the edges as square as you can.
  3. Spread the chocolate filling over the dough, leaving about a 2cm gap around the edges. Sprinkle the hazelnuts and diced pear over the top.
  4. From the long side, roll the dough tightly into a log. Use a sharp knife to cut the log lengthwise down the middle, to give you two equal long pieces (see the photos)
  5. Place one piece of dough over the second to create an X then braid together the two pieces of dough. Shuffle and squash it into a shorter braid, then gently lift the babka into the loaf pan.
  6. Proof in a warm place for about an hour.
  7. Bake at 180°C for 30 minutes, or until deep golden.
  8. Make the sugar syrup by combining the sugar and water in a small pot over high heat. Stir to dissolve the sugar, then boil for 2 minutes.

  9. Use a pastry brush to liberally brush the syrup over the babka. It may seem like a lot, but trust me, it works!

  10. Leave to cool in the tin for at least half an hour or so - I won’t say completely because it’s too hard to resist.