Rose Danish Braid

Directions

• Make the pastry dough: stir together warm water, yeast, and 1 tbsp sugar in a large bowl. Let the mixture rest for 5 minutes or until foamy on top. Stir in remaining sugar, milk, egg, and salt. Then lightly cover and set aside.
• Cut the cold butter into slices and add to a blender. Add the flour and pulse for a few seconds, until butter is in pea-size bits. (If you don’t have a blender you can use forks or your hands to rub the butter into the flour, but the process will take awhile!)
• Pour the flour mixture into the yeast mixture and gently fold together until dry ingredients are just combined. The dough will not look quite together yet. Either transfer it to a piece of plastic wrap, or cover the bowl it’s in tightly.
• Refrigerate the dough for at least 4 and at most 48 hours.
• Remove the dough from the refrigerator and flour a work surface. Flatten the dough into a square using your hands and then roll into an 8×15 inch rectangle using a rolling pin. Add flour as necessary to your work surface as the dough is a little sticky. Fold the dough into thirds and rotate it 90 degrees, then roll it into a rectangle again. Fold, rotate, and roll the dough for a total of 3 times to create a puffy and flaky pastry.
• Wrap or cover the dough again and refrigerate it for 1 to 24 hours. You can also freeze the dough at this point (see notes).
• Line one or two baking sheets with parchment paper, depending on whether you are making one or both danishes right now.
• Make the rose cream cheese filling: Using an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese, lemon juice, and vanilla until smooth. Add the sugar and rose syrup, and beat again until smooth. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
• Assemble the danishes: Remove the dough from the refrigerator and cut it in half using a sharp knife or bench scraper. Wrap one half and refrigerate it while you work with the other half, or freeze it if you’re making one danish right now (see notes).
• On a lightly floured work surface, roll the dough out to an 8×12 inch rectangle and transfer it to the baking sheet. Leaving three inches down the middle of the length of the rectangle, cut two corners off of one side of the dough and two triangles of off the other side, as shown in the image below. I like to reserve these scraps and add them to the end of the braid.
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• Leaving the middle row untouched, cut ten parallel strips out of the top and bottom flaps. Add the filling to the middle row of dough. Alternate pulling the strips across the middle row to create a plait or braid.
• Refrigerate the braid for 15 minutes to an hour to keep the pastry as cold as possible before it enters the oven. Skipping this step creates the risk of butter leaking out of the warm pastry as it bakes.
• Repeat steps 10-13 for the second braid if making now. When you’re ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• Bake the danish braid(s) for 18-20 minutes. The top of the pastry should be lightly browned. Cool for five minutes, then serve warm!