This is a stock photo - I'll get one of my own soon
But this is actually what it looks like.

Mom's Viennese Poppyseed Strudel (the easy breezy version)

Ingredients:
2 Cups GROUND poppyseeds - you can get these from any German/Austrian/Hungarian restaurant or supplies store
1.5 Cups Milk
1/4 Cup Water
4 Tablespoons Butter
3/4 Cup White Sugar
1 TBS Lemon Juice
1/4 Tsp Salt

1 box frozen pastry dough (includes two squares of dough - available in any grocery store)
Confectionary sugar to sprinkle on top

Optional Ingredients:
2 TBS Honey
1/3 Cup coarsely chopped raisins
1/4 Tsp Cinnamon
/2 Cup Chopped Almonds
4 TBS Seedless raspberry jam or jelly (add after cooking)
1 small tart apple - grated (add after cooking)

My mother was from Vienna, Austria and she made a wonderful poppyseed strudel when I was growing up that we ate at every special occasion. She made the dough homemade, but sadly, I'm far too lazy to make homemade dough. Fortunately the frozen pastry dough works just as well! If you love phyllo dough sheets you can also use those with layers of butter in between, but that's quite a bit more work.

I've made this recipe uber-simple so that you won't have to buy unusual ingredients, but of course the traditional recipes use lemon zest instead of lemon juice and that sort of thing. Feel free to get fancy if you so desire.

Combine the ground poppyseeds, milk, water, butter, sugar, lemon juice and salt in a heavy pot and cook on a low flame until you have a low boil. Lower heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes until mixture thickens into a paste. Stir regularly as this burns easily.

Remove from stove and refrigerate until cold where it will thicken some more. When cold, spread out half of the mixture onto each pastry sheet (these take about an hour to defrost) and roll up into a jelly roll. Place the folded side downward. Bake in a 375 oven for about 40 minutes until golden brown on top. Sprinkle confectionary sugar on top and serve. MMMMMmmmm!

This strudel is far and away best served hot. It's good the next day, and slightly less good each day after as the pastry dough settles down.

Please feel free to use and share this recipe! ~ Cybèle

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