Miodownik: four thin honey layers, a sour cream filling and a day in the fridge
A honey dough cooked over a water bath, rolled into four thin sheets and baked for six minutes each. They come out of the oven as hard as biscuits — and that is exactly right. Only the moisture from the cream, migrating into them over a day in the fridge, turns them into soft layers. Cut a miodownik the same day and you will be sawing.
Your own work in that: 50 min.
- Dough 20 min
- Dough resting 30 min
- Rolling 20 min
- Baking the layers 32 min
- Filling 10 min
- Maturing in the fridge 1440 min
Step by step
0 / 8 doneMelt the honey with sugar and butter
In a bowl set over a pan of barely steaming water (the base must not touch the water), melt the honey, sugar and butter, whisking for 8 minutes, until smooth and the sugar has completely dissolved.
Ingredients: 200 g honey · 120 g sugar · 100 g butter · 2 pcs eggs · 550 g plain flour · 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp gingerbread spice mix · 1 pinch salt
TipThe water bath is not fussiness. Over a direct flame honey easily catches on the base of the pan and turns bitter, while over steam the mixture cannot pass boiling point even if you forget about it.
Over steam, eight minutes, until smoothCool and bring the dough together
Lift the bowl off and cool the mixture 10 minutes, to lukewarm. Whisk in the eggs. Sift the flour with the soda, spice and salt, add to the mixture and knead briefly into a soft, slightly tacky dough. Wrap in film and rest 30 minutes.
Ingredients: 200 g honey · 120 g sugar · 100 g butter · 2 pcs eggs · 550 g plain flour · 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp gingerbread spice mix · 1 pinch salt
TipEggs added to a hot mixture set into threads. Test with a finger: the mixture should feel like a baby's bathwater, no hotter. And soda, not baking powder — it reacts with the acids in honey, lightens the thin sheets and gives them their dark honey colour.
Lukewarm mixture, eggs, spiced flour with sodaRoll four sheets
Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces (about 270 g each). Roll each directly on a sheet of baking paper into a 25 × 35 cm rectangle, 3 mm thick, dusting with the barest minimum of flour. Work with one piece and keep the rest under film.
Ingredients: 200 g honey · 120 g sugar · 100 g butter · 2 pcs eggs · 550 g plain flour · 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp gingerbread spice mix · 1 pinch salt
TipRoll on the paper, because this dough cannot be moved: a thin warm sheet tears the moment you lift it. The paper goes onto the tray with the dough and peels away by itself after baking.
Three millimetres, straight onto the paperBake six minutes each
Heat the oven to 180 °C. Bake each sheet 6–8 minutes, until deep golden and springy under a finger — one sheet after another, about 30 minutes in all. While hot and still on its paper, trim it with a knife into a clean rectangle; keep the offcuts. After a minute the sheet hardens and will shatter instead of cutting.
TipA sheet straight from the oven is hard, and that is correct — don't bake it ‘until soft’, because overbaked, the honey starts to scorch and turn bitter.
Six minutes, trimmed while hotMake the filling
Stir the cold thick sour cream with the icing sugar and grated lemon zest using a spatula. Do not whip it — 18 % sour cream will not hold stiff peaks, and beating it with a mixer only thins it further.
Ingredients: 500 g sour cream, 18 % · 120 g icing sugar · 1 pcs lemon, zest
TipThe filling is meant to be loose. It is what hands its moisture to the hard layers; a stiff cream that does not soak in would leave the miodownik crunchy for good.
Stirred, not whipped, a loose creamStack the layers
Put the first sheet on a board, spread a third of the filling evenly right to the edges, lay the next sheet on top and press lightly with your palm. Repeat twice. The fourth sheet goes on top with no filling.
Three layers of filling, right to the edgesGlaze with chocolate
Melt the chocolate with the butter over steam and spread it over the top sheet. Leave a few minutes, until the glaze stops flowing.
Ingredients: 100 g dark chocolate · 30 g butter
A thin layer of chocolate with butterWait a day
Cover, weigh down lightly with a board and refrigerate 24 hours, ideally 48. Only then cut into 16 squares with a sharp knife. Tightly covered, it keeps up to five days in the fridge.
TipThis is the one step that cannot be skipped. The dry sheets slowly draw moisture from the filling — that takes a day, and only then does a knife go through the cake instead of crushing it.
After a day: four soft layers
Before you start
Semolina cream instead of sour cream
Cook 500 ml milk with 60 g semolina and 80 g sugar into a thick pudding, cool to room temperature and beat it into 200 g soft butter. The filling is firmer and sweeter; extend the maturing to two days then.
Crooked or cracked sheets
The dough was too cold. Honey dough is rolled warm and soft; if it has been in the fridge, leave it 20 minutes somewhere warm before rolling.
Use the offcuts
Grind or crush the trimmed edges and press them onto the sides of the assembled cake. The classic finish for a miodownik, and a way to waste nothing.
