Makowiec dough calculator
The yeast dough for a Polish poppy-seed roll: milk, yolks, a little butter and a heavy hand with fresh yeast, rolled around a poppy filling and baked in paper.
Total hydration counts the water inside the eggs, milk and butter.
A makowiec is a sheet of soft yeast dough rolled around twice its weight in poppy filling, baked wrapped in paper so it keeps its shape. The dough is the simpler half: milk, yolks, a little sugar and butter, and far more fresh yeast than any bread.
How it works
The dough
Kwestia Smaku’s makowiec makes two rolls from 500 g of flour: 200 ml of milk (40%), 4 yolks (14%), 50 g each of sugar, butter and fresh yeast (10% of each). The yeast goes into a well in the flour with the sugar and warm milk for ten minutes, then the yolks and melted butter, and 10 to 15 minutes of kneading until the dough is smooth and elastic. An hour in a warm place to rise. The pinch of salt is Moje Wypieki’s half teaspoon on 450 g; Kwestia Smaku salts only the egg whites for the filling.
Filling and rolling
Each half of the dough is rolled to about 30 by 35 cm and spread with half the filling, leaving a 1.5 cm border. Kwestia Smaku uses 850 g of ready poppy mass folded with two tablespoons of breadcrumbs and four stiffly beaten egg whites; Moje Wypieki grinds 500 g of poppy seed twice and mixes it with brown sugar, honey, raisins, walnuts and candied peel. Roll along the long side, seal the seam, and wrap each roll in greased baking paper with about 2 cm of slack for the rise.
Baking
Seam down, 20 minutes to rest, then 35 minutes at 180 °C. Cool before icing: hot lemon juice with orange peel and icing sugar stirred in a spoon at a time.
Sources & methodology
Every percentage in this calculator traces to the published sources below — nothing is invented. Where respected sources disagree, the default sits inside the documented range.
- Kwestia Smaku — Makowiec — The anchor: 500 g of flour, 200 ml of milk, four yolks, 50 g each of sugar, butter and fresh yeast; an hour to rise, two 35 cm rolls with 850 g of poppy filling, 35 minutes at 180 °C.
- Moje Wypieki — Makowiec zawijany — The rich end: 150 g of butter and six yolks on 450 g of flour, 45 g of fresh yeast, and the half teaspoon of salt the salt row is taken from; the poppy filling ground from 500 g of seed.
- AniaGotuje — Makowiec zawijany — The lean end of the yolk and milk bands: two yolks and at least 140 ml of milk on 500 g of flour, 100 g each of butter and sugar, 40 g of fresh yeast.
- Kwestia Smaku — Makowiec tradycyjny — The wettest, yeastiest dough: 190 ml of milk, six yolks and 50 g of fresh yeast on 380 g of cake flour, 110 g of butter.
- Kwestia Smaku — Makowiec zawijany (the overnight dough) — The overnight version: 7 g of instant yeast on 500 g of flour with four whole eggs and 200 g of butter, a night in the fridge, 2–3 hours to rise, 35–40 minutes at 180 °C.
FAQ
Why 10% fresh yeast?
Because the dough is rich, cold from the yolks and butter, and given about an hour. Every Polish makowiec dough is dosed like this: AniaGotuje 40 g on 500 g (8%), Moje Wypieki 45 g on 450 g, Kwestia Smaku’s traditional recipe 50 g on 380 g (13%). The yeast switch converts the row if you keep dry yeast; Kwestia Smaku’s overnight version uses 7 g of instant on 500 g and a night in the fridge instead.
How rich can the dough be?
Moje Wypieki puts 150 g of butter and 6 yolks into 450 g of flour, three times the butter and nearly twice the yolk of the default. Richer dough is softer and keeps longer; it also rises more slowly, which is one reason her yeast is at 10% too.
How much filling per roll?
Kwestia Smaku’s two rolls take 850 g of poppy mass for 920 g of dough, close to equal weights. The rolls are about 35 cm long.
Can I use canned poppy filling?
Kwestia Smaku’s recipe is written for it: one 850 g can, breadcrumbs to firm it and beaten whites to lighten it. Ground poppy from scratch, scalded and put twice through the fine plate of a meat grinder, is Moje Wypieki’s way.
More from Sweet & enriched
Polish Easter babka calculator
Babka drożdżowa for Easter: a soft yeast dough on milk and yolks with raisins kneaded in, baked in a tube tin and iced with lemon.
Hydration 56% · 1250 g
Rogale świętomarcińskie dough calculator
Poznań’s St. Martin croissants: a yeast dough laminated three times with grated frozen butter, filled with white poppy seed.
Hydration 51% · 26 × 80 g
Faworki dough calculator
Faworki, the Polish angel wings: a stiff dough of flour, sour cream and yolks with a spoon of spirit, beaten with a rolling pin, rolled paper-thin and fried.
Hydration 12% · 70 × 10 g
Cinnamon roll dough calculator
Cinnamon rolls on a tangzhong dough that is still soft the next day. Filling ratios included.
Hydration 74% · 8 × 100 g
Sweet dough calculators10 calculators