How to make the best Apple Strudel you've ever tasted

Thank goodness the days when a woman's worth as a marriage partner in Austria was judged by her ability to make strudel pastry without a hole are over or there would be lots of unmarried travel writers.

How do I know this? Take a group of travel writers, a large lump of pastry and a rolling pin and it's not hard to work out who would be left on the shelf.

The Austrian National Tourist Office was in town recently with a pop up apple strudel making class at Alchemy Restaurant.

There were some excellent tips from a master Apple strudel maker.

It's a simple dough and the secret is in the resting
You can roll it out with the rolling pin but also stretch the dough
Remove your rings if you don't want holes in the dough
Pull until nice and thin and can almost see through the pastry
Cut off the thick edges
Sprinkle with bread crumbs so the apples don't soak through the dough too quickly
Spread with apples and raisins
Fold sides in and use the tablecloth to roll up. Brush with butter and put in the oven for an hour to caramelised the apple at about 180 degrees
The pastry will be cooked after half an hour if you are desperate.

Apfelstrudel (Apple strudel)

Ingredients:

Strudel dough
¼ kg (8.8 oz./2 cups) very fine flour
1 teaspoon salt
1‐2 tablespoons oil
About 1/8 litre (½ cup) lukewarm water
100 g (3.5 oz./ ¾ cup) dry bread crumbs
125 g (4.4 oz. / 5/8 cup) butter
1 ½ ‐ 2 kg (3 ½ ‐ 4 ½ lbs.) apples
Sugar and Cinnamon
Ground cloves
Walnuts and raisins

Method
For the Strudel dough, mix together flour, salt, oil and enough lukewarm water to make a soft dough. Knead very well until it becomes silky and smooth.

Form the dough into a loaf, cover and allow to rest for about 30 minutes. Roll out the
dough on a table covered with a floured cloth. Place your hands under the dough
and, using your thumbs and the back of your hand, gently begin pulling and stretching
the dough until wafer‐thin. Trim away the thick edges.

Brown the bread crumbs in some of the butter until golden brown. Brush the strudel
dough with melted butter and spread the bread crumbs over it. Peel and core the
apples, cut into thin slices (a cucumber slicer may be used) or grate coarsely.

Season with sugar, cinnamon and a pinch of ground cloves and spread on top of the bread
crumbs. If you like, scatter a few raisins and/or coarsely grated walnuts on top.

Using the cloth to help lift the dough, roll up the strudel from the sides as you would a jelly
roll. Place it seam-side down on a baking tray, brush generously with butter and bake
at 180°C (350° F) until golden brown.

Here's our group effort at making Apfelstrudel

Sarah tried to peel the apple without breaking the peel - not so easy!

David started the pastry rolling.

David, Sarah and Lee pull the pastry carefully, trying to avoid making holes.

Lee used the tablecloth to roll the strudel

And roll the strudel

And this is one that was made earlier (I'm sure ours would have looked like this)

The Austrian National Tourist Office chose Alchemy's riverside views for their strudel making class. It was as close to the Danube as they could get. Obviously, we had to use a LOT of imagination there.

Judging by my fondness for Gustav Klimt's work, I think I am a little Viennese at heart. Austria is certainly on my bucket list and here are my five top food reasons to visit Vienna!