The holidays wouldn’t be complete without some of our favorite foods and traditions. Stollen, or Christstollen, is a German bread or cake made with dried fruit, candied citrus peel, and spices. The more popular version includes a long slab of storebought or homemade marzipan, or almond paste, and a generous dusting of powdered sugar.
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You know the holidays are here when the stollen is on the table. This Christmas-time favorite gets an Amish Friendship Bread makeover with a few swaps from the classic recipe. This version is more like a cake than the bread, but it’s just as delicious. We even have a great recipe for homemade marzipan, too.
There are different types of stollen (see the Resources list below). The modern-day stollen has gone through several iterations, including the use of candied cherries. Most stores carry candied red and green cherries, but if you can’t find them, try this easy homemade candied citrus peel recipe.
Stollen made its mark in history in 1730, when August the Strong in Dresden had the local bakers make a 4,000-pound cake that would allow everyone to have a slice. It sounds a lot like Amish Friendship Bread, doesn’t it? Sharing what we have with others … it’s what the Friendship Bread Kitchen is all about.
- 1 cup Amish Friendship Bread Starter
- 3 eggs
- 1 cup oil
- ½ cup milk
- 1 cup sugar
- ½ teaspoon vanilla
- 2 teaspoons almond extract
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- 2 cups flour
- 1-2 small boxes instant vanilla pudding
- ½ cup chopped red cherries
- ½ cup chopped green cherries
- ½ cup diced dried mango
- ½ cup chopped walnuts
- 3 ounces marzipan or almond paste
- Preheat oven to 325° F (165° C).
- In a large mixing bowl, add ingredients as listed.
- Grease two large loaf pans.
- Pour half of batter in greased pan lined with sugar. Lay a strip of marzipan or almond paste along length of bread. Top with remaining batter.
- Bake for one hour or until the bread loosens evenly from the sides and a toothpick inserted in the center of the bread comes out clean.
- Once cool, sprinkle with powdered sugar.
- ENJOY!
While we loved how much this tasted like the real thing, you can also make this recipe without the marzipan/almond paste addition.
Need a quick substitution for the cherries? Try it with chopped candied citrus peel. Get the recipe here.
Resources
- A Brief History of Stollen: https://www.dresdenstollen.com/history/stollen_history.asp
- Dresden Stollen History: https://whatscookingamerica.net/History/Cakes/Stollen.htm
- A Four-Ton Cake: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/dresden-stollen
- Types of Stollen: http://www.germanfoodguide.com/stollen.cfm
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Hi, I would love to make this stollen but what is the instant vanilla pudding please, and what can I use instead? I am British and haven’t seen this product in the UK.
Many thanks.
Hi Pauline!
You can either skip the pudding (which boosts flavor and moisture) or use our homemade recipe here: https://www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com/pantry/vanilla-instant-pudding.
Thanks for visiting from across the water! Happy holidays!
Thank you so much for that. I will definitely give it a try. It doesn’t have to be christmas to enjoy a good stollen does it 🙂
You have two options you and use in place of the vanilla instant pudding that we Americans use the first is to use Bird’s Custard powder which is likely the best option. Instant pudding is a dehydrated custard that is packaged and sold under the Jello brand name. This means that the second option is to make a vanilla flavored custard then the dehydrate it then to add the powder that would be equal to two cups reconstituted. Jello uses approximately 4 tablespoons per box. Whenever pudding is added to cake recipes they create and heavier silky textured cake when cooked. Hope this will help you!
Hi. When the recipe states mix all ingredients, does that mean you mix the 3oz almond paste into the batter and place additional paste on the top? Thank you in advance. I can’t wait to try this but just want to get it right :]
Hi Tracey,
You don’t add the almond paste to the mixture. You pour half of the mix between the two pans, pop the almond paste on top of this, then divide the remaining mix between your two pans and bake.
Hope that helps 🙂
Oh that’s great, I have always got a tub of birds custard powder in my cupboard 🙂 Thank you so much for taking the time to help.
I’d like to try this recipe because I’m always on the lookout for recipes to use for the church bazaar.
This looks so yummy! I love it when I am in Holland and they have these breads with the marzipan paste in the middle. I would make this for my family. (There’s 4 of us!)
I keep seeing re ipes that say add the ingredients to the starter, but I need to make a starter to share How is this done plese
If you scroll down to just below the ad for the books you will see some other tabs, click on AMISH FRIENDSHIP BREAD STARTER (ORIGINAL) and you will have the recipe. Hope that helps.
My late MIL and I used to make loaves, loaves and more loaves of “Amish Friendship Fruitcake Bread” every year back in the mid to late 1990s. Our recipe was very similar to this. We didn’t use the almond paste, or the mango. We used glace cherries and pineapple, golden raisins, candied peel mix, walnuts and pecans. We also added rum extract, in addition to the vanilla.
We made big loaves, mini loaves, muffin loaves, even baked it in small iron skillets we had when we ran out of other baking pans to use. (She had 7 grown children, and their families that she gifted with her goodies, plus sisters, friends, and other folks, like the mail carrier, and the gas station attendant, and the trash man.)