Homemade Danish pastries with cheese or remonce
Short answer
A cheese danish is a sweet pastry with cream-cheese filling. This home version uses yeast dough laminated with butter and includes a remonce alternative. Keeping the dough and butter cool preserves the separate layers. The recipe makes approximately eight large pastries, four of each filling.
Ingredients
Dough: 250 g plain wheat flour, 100 ml cold milk, 10 g fresh yeast, 25 g sugar, 4 g fine salt, 1 small egg and 25 g softened butter.
Butter layer: 125 g cold butter.
Filling for four cheese pastries: 100 g plain cream cheese, 20 g sugar, ½ tsp vanilla sugar and a little finely grated lemon zest.
Filling for four remonce pastries: 40 g softened butter, 40 g sugar and 40 g grated marzipan.
Glaze: 1 beaten egg. Keep a little extra flour for rolling.
This is an original home version. The professional sources below explain traditional lamination and remonce; the recipe does not reproduce a particular bakery product.
Mix the dough
Dissolve the yeast in the milk. Add the egg, sugar, salt, flour and 25 g softened butter. Mix and knead only until uniform and cohesive. Flatten into a square, wrap and refrigerate while preparing the butter.
Flatten the 125 g cold butter between sheets of baking paper into a square approximately 12 x 12 cm. It should bend without cracking but should not look oily or melted.
Enclose and fold
Roll the dough to approximately 18 x 18 cm. Place the butter diagonally in the centre, fold the corners over it like an envelope and seal the joins. The butter must be fully enclosed.
Gently roll into a long rectangle. Brush off excess flour. Fold one short end over the centre and the other end over that, creating a three-fold packet.
Turn the packet a quarter-turn. Chill until firm enough to roll, then repeat the rolling and three-fold process twice more. Allow roughly 20 minutes of chilling between turns, adjusting to the dough's condition. If butter starts smearing, return the packet to the refrigerator.
Fill and shape
Mix the cream-cheese filling in one bowl and the remonce in another.
Roll the chilled dough to approximately 24 x 48 cm and cut into eight squares. Fold the corners towards the centre, press them down and make a small hollow. Divide the cheese filling between four pastries and the remonce between the other four. Keep filling central and leave exposed pastry edges.
Space the pastries on baking paper. Cover and prove at ordinary room temperature until visibly lighter, approximately 45-60 minutes. Do not use a hot oven for proving because the butter may melt out.
Bake
Preheat to 200 °C conventional heat. Gently brush the exposed dough with beaten egg. Bake on the middle shelf for approximately 20-25 minutes, until distinctly golden and the layers are cooked through. Timing varies with size and oven.
Allow the pastries to settle on a rack. The filling is very hot straight from the oven. Do not leave cream-cheese pastries out all day; refrigerate leftovers once cooled.
Questions and answers
Use plain cream cheese for this sweet version.
No. Here it contains butter, sugar and marzipan.
No. It must remain in separate layers.
Chilling keeps the butter workable and makes rolling easier.
Yes. Double the chosen filling quantity.
Yes, including wheat, milk, eggs and almonds in marzipan. Check your individual ingredient labels.
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