Make your own 'semla'

Fastlagsbulle, hetvägg or fettisdagsbulle - "Kärt barn har många namn" / A loved child goes under many names ... 

• 

  Semla or fastlagsbulle or fettisdagsbulle - we have many names for the things we love!

• This recipe yields 16-20 buns.

• Ingredients:
  5 Tablespoons butter
  1 cup milk
  1-1/2 Tablespoons yeast
  1 pinch salt
  3 Tablespoons sugar
  3 cups wheat flour
  1 teaspoon cardamom
  1/2 cup egg, beaten

• Filling:
  10 oz. almond paste
  1/2 cup milk
  1-1/2 cups double cream
  confectioner’s sugar

• Directions:
  Melt the butter in a saucepan, pour in the milk and warm until lukewarm (99° F).
  Crumble the yeast in a bowl and stir in a little of the warm butter-milk mixture until the yeast is completely dissolved.
  Add the rest of the butter-milk mixture, salt, sugar, cardamom and most of the flour (save some for the rest of the baking). Work the dough smooth and shiny. It should let go from the edges of the bowl.
  Allow the dough to rise under a baking cloth for 40 minutes.
  Sprinkle flour over a baking board and place the dough there.
  Make the buns by rolling the dough against the baking board in your cupped hand.
  Put the buns on a baking tray with oven paper and allow them to rise for an additional 30 minutes.
  Preheat the oven to 450° F.
  Brush the buns with the beaten egg and bake them for about 10 minutes in the middle of the oven.
  Let them cool on an oven rack under a baking cloth.
  Cut off the very top of each bun.
  Take out part of the insides and put it in a bowl.
  Crumble in almond paste, mix with the insides and dilute with some milk to a rather soft mixture. Put this filling back into the buns.
  Whip the cream and put a large dollop in every bun. Put the tops back on and sift some confectioners’ sugar over ‘semlorna’.
  Enjoy as is or as a hetvägg in a bowl of warm milk with a pinch of salt.