Every year, food photographers, bloggers and foodies around the world are posting big pancake stacks on Shrove Tuesday - while across the Nordics, we have a different treat to celebrate with!
We are stuffing our faces with shove buns of different sizes and shapes every since January! Their proper names are: semla (Sweden), laskiaispulla (Finland), fastelavnsbolle (Norway, Denmark), and vastlakukkel (Estonia).
My classic Shrove Bun recipe is one of the most popular dessert on my blog - but celebrating the fact that it was 10 years ago when I started my expat life in Sweden I brought you a bada$$ fusion of 2 typical Nordic desserts!
I saw some green marzipan-covered shrove buns before that their authors called "Princess Shrove Bun", but these were missing an important point: while they resembled a Princess Cake from the outside, their fillings were the classic shrove buns' whipped cream + almond paste or jam...
This did not quite match my vision for a proper Shrove Bun x Princess Cake fusion, so here I am with a brand new deluxe shrove bun version: the Princess Semla for my friends in the Nordics: cardamom-flavoured sweet yeast buns (like a typical Shrove Bun) filled with vanilla custard + jam + whipped cream filling (like in a Princess Cake).
If you have ever tried shrove buns, which version is your favourite? Almond, jam or something special?
Ingredients
Dough
- classic shrove buns from scratch / unfilled shrove buns from the store
Filling, topping
- green marzipan
- pink marzipan rose
- whipped cream
- jam
- vanilla custard
- icing sugar
Instructions
- Prepare my classic Semla dough or, if you do not have the chance to bake them from scratch, you can also grab some unfilled shrove buns in the store.
- Your life will be easier if you can buy a pre-rolled green marzipan sheet - but you can roll it at home on a surface lightly dusted with icing sugar too. Make sure that the marzipan is as thin as possible: for example, I can still handle the sheet if it is around 1 mm thick.
- Based on the size of your shrove buns, cut circles out of the thin marzipan sheet that will be enough to cover your pastries. I normally reference the diameter of the buns + add 2-5 cm to determine the correct diameter of the marzipan discs - it all depends on the size/height of the buns. Experiment with one bun first until you can cover the full surface of the bun and fold the edges under in a way that it does not open up anymore. When you have the adequate marzipan disc size, continue with the remaining buns and place them onto a tray lined with a baking sheet, so the marzipan will not stick on the surface. Put the buns into the fridge until you prepare the ffllings.
- Prepare a vanilla custard (with a more firm texture) and chill it in the fridge - or use a store-bought version. Fill the custard into a piping bag with a round tip.
- Prepare the whipping cream. In case you want to store the filled buns in the fridge for a while before serving them, you will need stabilised whipped cream (or Chantilly cream) to stop the cream from collapsing. Fill the whipped cream into a piping bag with a star tip (you can also opt-in for the ready-to-use aerosols with an in-built star tip).
- Assemble the buns
- Cut off the top of the marzipan-covered buns: secure a small marzipan rose on the lid
- Fill the bottom parts:
- pipe a vanilla custard circle along the cut edges of each bun bottoms
- fill the centres with the jam
- pipe the whipped cream on top
- close the buns with their lids
- sprinkle them with icing sugar
- Serve the Princess Shrove Buns to your guests right away!
Photo by © Reka Csulak - Three Pod Studio
