High Altitude Brunsviger (Danish Coffee Cake)
Classic brunsviger or Danish coffee cake, made with a soft, fluffy yeast dough that's subtly spiced with cardamom and vanilla, topped with butter and brown sugar.
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Dough Hook
- 9x13 Baking Dish
Ingredients
Dough
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter
- 1 ¼ cups whole milk
- 2 ¼ tsp (1 packet) instant/rapid rise yeast or active dry yeast
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- 4 ½ cups all purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- 1 tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- ½ tsp ground cardamom
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Topping
- ¾ cup (12 tbsp) unsalted butter, melted
- ¾ cup light or dark brown sugar, lightly packed
Instructions
Make the Dough
- Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. Add the milk and stir. Warm the mixture just until it reaches between 110-115 degrees F.If it gets too hot, let it sit for a few minutes until it cools down to the correct temperature. It's important that you check the temperature - if it's too cold, it won't activate the yeast, and if it's too hot, it will kill the yeast.
- Remove the saucepan from the heat. Stir in the yeast and 1 teaspoon of the sugar. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes until it begins to foam and bubble; this will let you know that the yeast is active.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer, combine the flour, sugar, salt, and cardamom. Add the warm milk mixture, eggs and vanilla. With the dough hook, knead on medium/low speed for 10 minutes. The dough will be soft, sticky and loose, but don't add more flour.
- Lightly spray a large bowl with nonstick spray. Scrape the dough into the bowl, cover tightly with plastic wrap, and set in a warm place to rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
- If your oven has a bread-proofing setting, you can use that to proof your dough. If not, let your oven preheat to the lowest setting, turn the oven off, and then set your dough inside to rise.
Add the Topping
- Melt the butter for the topping, then brush 2 tbsp of the melted butter inside a 9x13 inch baking dish.
- Gently deflate the dough by scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, then scrape the dough into the buttered baking dish. Turn the dough to coat it in the butter, then gently stretch it to fill the bottom of the pan.
- Set the pan in a warm place to rest until the dough is puffy, about 20-30 minutes. Do not let the dough puff up so much that it fills the pan and comes up to the top edge, since it will puff up quite a bit more when it bakes.
- With buttered fingers, gently dimple the dough all over; make the dimples fairly deep, so the sauce can puddle in the dimples.
- In a saucepan, combine the rest of the melted butter with the brown sugar, and warm it over medium low heat for several minutes, just until smooth and the sugar is dissolved. Pour the melted butter and brown sugar over the dough.
Bake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven.
- Bake the cake for about 35 minutes, until the topping is a deep golden brown, and a digital instant read thermometer inserted into the center reads between 190-195F.
- Let cool for 10 minutes, then serve warm. This cake is fantastic plain, although my kids liked to eat theirs topped with jam. A scoop of ice cream melting over the warm cake wouldn't be bad, either.
Notes
Keep the leftover cake in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days. Reheat individual pieces in the microwave for 20 seconds at 50% power.
If you like, you can add 2 tsp ground cinnamon to the melted butter and brown sugar mixture for more of a cinnamon roll flavor. I also like this recipe with 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg added to the dough, in addition to the cardamom.
For a crunchier topping, pour the melted butter over the dough, then sprinkle with the brown sugar. This way, the brown sugar will not fully dissolve in the butter, and you'll get crunchy, sugary bits all over the top.
https://curlygirlkitchen.com/