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You are here: Home / Breakfast / Muffins & Sweet Bread / Vegan Povitica – Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

Vegan Povitica – Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

December 25, 2016 By Gloria 17 Comments

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Please note that this post contains affiliate links of products that I love and use. This rewards me with a small commission if you choose to buy through the links and none of this will cost you anything – but it does help me pay the bills and deliver you quality content. – Love, Gloria.

Even though I am not a big fan of winter, there is one big reason why I do look forward to it. Nuts! Walnuts to be precise. Where I come from the walnut is a staple ingredient in pastry. In Croatia, we use the humble walnut in a lot of things ranging from liqueurs to pastry. Many wonderful desserts can be made with this nut and while I do love cookies, ice cream and pies this simple, sweet bread is my all time favourite. This vegan povitica makes a stunning centrepiece for any party and is so very easily made.

Vegan Povitica - Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

As a child, I used to dip it into hot chocolate, and I could eat it for every meal of the day. Now that I am a grown up I still can not get enough of it! While the traditional version is filled with walnuts, sugar, and butter, you can do whatever you want. There are many variations of this as you can swap around ingredients as much as you like.

Vegan Povitica - Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

There are also different ways of rolling your povitica. While some prefer a perfectly rolled swirl, others like to have more of a random ripple effect. This is the only thing people tend to argue about, and it is hilarious. I guess every country has this one food topic on which people just can not find common ground. I noticed that here in England too – with scones. The debate weather you should use jam or clotted cream first is a never ending one.

Vegan Povitica - Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

I am somewhat stuck in between. I love the loosely rolled swirl. It allows for thick little clusters of nutty, sweet goodness once you cut it into slices. Perfectly and firmly rolled swirls tend to produce a rather dull eating experience in my opinion, while the loosely rolled ripples fall apart too much. As you can see,  a lot of time can be spent thinking on how to roll this; it’s serious business! Ha!

Vegan Povitica - Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

In any case, there is one thing you can not argue about. The simplicity of this dish is what makes it so genius. It looks so decadent and tastes wonderfully delicious, but it is so straightforward to make. It needs only a few ingredients that are not hard to come by, and those are inexpensive as well. If you never had a povitica before you should definitely make one. It is one of those dishes that I believe everyone should taste at least once in their life.

 

 

Vegan Povitica - Croatian Sweet Walnut Bread

Course: Pastry
Cuisine: Vegan
Servings: 15 slices
Calories: 256kcal
Author: The Greedy Vegan
This vegan povitica is a great treat during the holidays. It is a stunning centrepiece for any table and very easily made.
Print Recipe
Metric - US Customary

Ingredients

For the dough:

  • 175 ml almond milk or any of your choice
  • 3 tbsp sugar
  • 1 tbsp coconut oil
  • 1 vanilla pod scraped
  • 300 g all purpose flour
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Yeast mixture:

  • 1 tsp sugar
  • 4 tbsp water warm
  • 1 1/2 tsp dry yeast

For the filling:

  • 300 g walnuts
  • 6 tbsp sugar
  • 2 tbsp cocoa
  • 125 ml almond milk

For brushing:

  • 1 tbsp coconut oil melted
  • 2 tsp sugar

Instructions

  • Pour the almond milk, 3 tbsp sugar, 1 tbsp coconut oil and the scraped out part of a vanilla pod into a small saucepan. If you want you can put the vanilla pod in there as well for extra flavour. Heat the mixture gently until all is combined evenly, take the vanilla pod out if you added it and let it cool down to room temperature.
  • To prepare the yeast, add 4 tbsp of water and 1 tsp sugar. Mix well and let it rest until it's slightly foamy - usually around 5 minutes, it should be ready by the time the milk mixture has cooled down.
  • Pour all dough ingredients in to a mixing bowl and knead well, add just enough extra flour until it stops being sticky. The dough should be really soft and bounce back when lightly poked. Form a ball out of the dough, dust it with some flour and cover it with a cloth. Let it rest for 1.5 hours in a warm place. It should at least double in size.
  • Place the walnuts, cocoa powder and sugar in, a food processor and pulse for a few seconds until all is evenly combined and resembles fine, dark sand. Pour the mixture into a bowl and add the milk. Mix it in by hand. Resist the urge to pout the milk into the food processor you will end up with a large dough like lump that is impossible to spread.
  • Once the dough has risen make sure you have a large surface to work on. I usually use the dining table for rolling out the dough. Dust the table lightly with flour and place the dough into the center. Gently roll it out into a huge circle with about 1m (40inch) in diameter. It should be as thin as possible. Make sure that it does not stick to the table. Add a little bit of flour if necessary but use it sparingly.
  • Spread the filling evenly onto the dough and roll it up. Place the dough into a lightly greased baking form and let it rest for another 15 minutes at room temperature. There is no real rule when it comes to placing the dough into a form. You can do that which ever way you like and every time you bake this bread you will, have a different pattern - which can be fun.
  • Brush the dough with 1 tablespoon of coconut oil and sprinkle 2 tsp of sugar over it. Bake the bread in a preheated oven for 10 minutes at 180°C (350°F). Lower the temperature to 150°C (300°F) and bake for another 40-45 minutes.

Notes

Traditionally this bread dough is rolled out on a linen cloth with helps a lot since you can easily lift the corners and it sticks less but once you made this a few times, it is not a necessity anymore.

Nutrition

Serving: 1slice | Calories: 256kcal | Carbohydrates: 26g | Protein: 5g | Fat: 15g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Sodium: 66mg | Potassium: 124mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 8g | Vitamin A: 5IU | Vitamin C: 0.2mg | Calcium: 48mg | Iron: 1.6mg

 

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Filed Under: All Recipes, Breakfast, Cakes, Pies & Tarts, Desserts & Sweets, Muffins & Sweet Bread Tagged With: bread, breakfast, cake, desserts, kid friendly, povitica, sweets, treat, vegan, vegetarian, walnut

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Comments

  1. Amanda says

    January 1, 2017 at 8:17 pm

    How much flour please? It’s not in the ingredient list.

    Reply
    • Gloria says

      January 1, 2017 at 8:31 pm

      Well, that’s embarrassing. It’s 300g (2cups) of all purpose flour. Thank you ever so much for pointing it out. Happy new year! =D – Love, G.

      Reply
      • Amanda says

        January 3, 2017 at 7:23 am

        Thanks very much. It turned out brilliantly! Happy New Year 🙂

        Reply
        • Gloria says

          January 3, 2017 at 12:49 pm

          I am so glad it did! Thank you for sharing. – Love, G.

          Reply
  2. Heather Johnson says

    July 20, 2017 at 2:55 am

    The traditional version filled with walnuts, sugar, and butter sounds absolutely amazing. This sweet bread looks and sounds super mouth-watering!

    Reply
  3. Chloe says

    July 20, 2017 at 9:25 am

    Now this looks SOOOO GOOD!!! I have a couple of friends who are vegan so this would be a perfect treat to make when they come over.

    Reply
  4. Cindy Gordon says

    July 20, 2017 at 8:44 pm

    5 stars
    I’ve never had this kind of bread before! It surely sounds delicious. I will have to find a way to make it gluten free! ❤

    Reply
  5. Sandy Dobbs says

    July 21, 2017 at 2:30 am

    I love walnuts and this recipes looks delicious! I plan to try this and substitute gluten-free flour. Like the swirls, too.

    Reply
  6. Echo says

    July 21, 2017 at 5:49 pm

    Oh my goodness, this looks incredible! I do love sweet breads, so I will have to try this one out!

    Reply
  7. Matt says

    July 21, 2017 at 6:03 pm

    I’m not a big fan of walnuts but that looks so delicious that I’m going to try it anyway!

    Reply
  8. Dorothy says

    March 8, 2018 at 6:38 pm

    Can I try this with bread flour?…

    Reply
    • Gloria says

      April 17, 2018 at 12:12 pm

      Hello Dorothy,
      I am utterly sorry for the late reply. I had big issues with my host. You can definitely try this with bread flour, the consistency will be slightly different but it does work. I have done it before when I ran out of all-purpose flour.

      Love, G.

      Reply
  9. Samantha says

    June 3, 2018 at 10:02 pm

    The dough requires milk-is this supposed to be a non-dairy milk? I thought the recipe was vegan.

    Reply
    • Gloria says

      June 4, 2018 at 9:04 am

      Hello Samantha, it is vegan. I didn’t specify because any non-dairy milk works for the dough. I edited the recipe card to avoid confusion in the future. Thanks for the question. – Love, G.

      Reply
  10. Matea says

    October 22, 2018 at 3:35 am

    5 stars

    This is awesome – vegan and takes me to my roots, thank you!

    Reply
  11. Stacy says

    November 13, 2020 at 9:37 pm

    Hello I just got all my ingredients out to make this. I used to make povatica with my grandma. In the ingredient list iy says 1T coconut oil but in the directions it says 2T coconut oil. Can you verify please? Thanks!

    Reply
    • Gloria says

      February 4, 2021 at 3:57 pm

      Sorry for the very late reply. It has been a rough year – for all of us. It is 1 spoon oil. – Much love, G.

      Reply

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