Danish pastry dough is a combination of puff pastry, with many thin layers and a yeast dough. It's flaky, buttery and very soft too. It can be used to create so many different variations of pastries, like croissants, and filled with myriads of cheese, jam, fruit, chocolate, nut fillings, all of them shaped into all sorts of pastries and breads.
Danish pastry bread is absolutely amazing and it's so good, I don't mind making it from scratch, because it's totally worth it. It's a mixture of soft yeast dough with buttery and flaky puff pastry. In my mind, it'a a match made in heaven. Puff pastry is wonderful in it's own way, but danish dough is not as greasy and is so tender and flaky.
It's not as intimidating as it sounds to make your own danish dough from scratch. With a little bit of time, your patience will be rewarded. What can you make from danish pastry dough? The possibilities are endless. One of my favorites is a Strawberry Cheesecake Danish Braid, Danish Cheese Pastries (use the same recipe, using the danish dough instead of puff pastry) Almond Bear Claws, which I will share very soon, and much, much more.
Recipe from allrecipes.com.
Ingredients:
Butter Rectangle:
2 cups butter, softened
⅔ cup all purpose flour
Danish dough:
8 cups flour
4 ½ teaspoons active dry yeast
2 ½ cups milk
½ cup sugar
2 teaspoons salt
2 eggs, slightly beaten
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Instructions:
Mix the softened butter with ⅔ cups flour until evenly combined. Divide the butter mixture in half. 
Roll out each half of the butter mixture into a 6x12 inch rectangle, in between parchment paper or wax paper. Chill until firm.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, mix 3 cups of flour with the yeast. 
In a small saucepan, mix the milk, sugar and salt. Heat it up on medium heat until the milk reaches 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit. Add the milk mixture, the eggs and vanilla to the flour and yeast mixture. 
Mix until smooth. 
Add the remaining flour, ½ a cup at a time until you have a smooth dough, kneading for at least 5 minutes at the end. 
Divide the dough in half, cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a warm place until it doubles in size, 30-60 minutes.
On a lightly floured surface, roll out each portion of dough into a 12x20 inch rectangle. 
Place the butter rectangle over half of the dough and fold the other half over it. 
Pinch of edges of dough together and roll it out into a 12x20 inch rectangle. 
At this point, fold the rectangle into thirds, like an envelope. 
Repeat by rolling out the dough again into a 12x20 inch rectangle and then fold it into thirds again. 
Repeat with the other portion of dough and the remaining butter rectangle.
Wrap each square of dough loosely in plastic wrap and place into the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. If at any point of the rolling process the butter becomes too warm and soft, place the dough into the refrigerator to chill.
After chilling for at least 30 minutes, the dough will rise slightly. Roll the dough again into a 12x20 inch rectangle, fold into thirds and repeat again. Chill for another 30 minutes or overnight before shaping the dough and baking it.
Danish Pastry Dough
Danish pastry dough is a combination of puff pastry, with many thin layers and a yeast dough. It's flaky, buttery and very soft too. It can be used to create so many different variations of pastries, like croissants, and filled with myriads of cheese, jam, fruit, chocolate, nut fillings, all of them shaped into all sorts of pastries and breads.
- Prep Time: 1 hour 30 mins
- Total Time: 1 hour 30 mins
- Category: Sweets
Ingredients
Butter Rectangle:
- 2 cups butter, softened
- ⅔ cup all purpose flour
Danish dough:
- 8 cups flour
- 4 ½ teaspoons active dry yeast
- 2 ½ cups milk
- ½ cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 2 eggs, slightly beaten
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Instructions
- Mix the softened butter with ⅔ cups flour until evenly combined. Divide the butter mixture in half. Roll out each half of the butter mixture into a 6x12 inch rectangle, in between parchment paper or wax paper. Chill until firm.
- Meanwhile, in a large bowl, mix 3 cups of flour with the yeast. In a small saucepan, mix the milk, sugar and salt. Heat it up on medium heat until the milk reaches 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Add the milk mixture, the eggs and vanilla to the flour and yeast mixture. Mix until smooth. Add the remaining flour, ½ a cup at a time until you have a smooth dough, kneading for at least 5 minutes at the end.
- Divide the dough in half, cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a warm place until it doubles in size, 30-60 minutes.
- On a lightly floured surface, roll out each portion of dough into a 12x20 inch rectangle.
- Place the butter rectangle over half of the dough and fold the other half over it. Pinch of edges of dough together and roll it out into a 12x20 inch rectangle.
- At this point, fold the rectangle into thirds, like an envelope. Repeat by rolling out the dough again into a 12x20 inch rectangle and then fold it into thirds again.
- Wrap each square of dough loosely in plastic wrap and place into the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. If at any point of the rolling process the butter becomes too warm and soft, place the dough into the refrigerator to chill.
- After chilling for at least 30 minutes, the dough will rise slightly. Roll the dough again into a 12x20 inch rectangle, fold into thirds and repeat again.
- Chill for another 30 minutes before shaping the dough and baking it.
Hello Olga! I have made this recipe before and is a lot of fun to make and use. I was wondering, could I use this recipe to make sfogliatella?
approximately how many servings does this recipe make? i am planning on making danish pastries but dont want to have way to much extra dough...Thanks!
~Cheyenne
Hey Olga, thanks for sharing. The pastry dough turned out great : ) I can't figure out why we initially mixed flour to the butter block. Is it to help thicken the butter a little and make it easier to work with? Thank you.
Yes, you are absolutely correct. I am so glad they worked out for you.
Hi.
I noticed there are no instructions to “turn” (or rotate) the dough after chilling and re-rolling, as seen in most laminated dough recipes. Is this correct? I just want to be sure before I get started.
Haven't tried it yet but it LOOKS like a pretty gud recipe...but what type of butter do I use....reg margarine or unsalted sweet cream butter???....and does it matter on whether I use all purpose flour or bread??
Hi Cela.
I use unsalted butter, not margarine.
I used all purpose flour, not bread flour, although I think both would work.
Hi Olga,
Just a quick question before I get started on this recipe, Is this dough good for bear claws? I'm actually searching for a dough recipe that is true to the nature of the bear claws themselves, I have found many dough recipes, but, they seem not to be true to the bear claw dough....This one sounds amazing, but I found another with the butter block and another person called it a croissant recipe...ugh, just want to get it right...
Thank you...
I haven't used this specific recipe for bear claws, but I think it would work very well.
Absolutely delicious! Time consuming, but that’s a good thing. Otherwise I’d be 400 pounds.
Hi Olga,
I'd like to try to make this danish doughwhich seems so amazing! But I would like to freeze most of it for later use. Once I wrap it airtight, for how long is it ok to store in the freezer?
Thank you!
You can freeze it for up to 3 months, Rita. I love making all kinds of pastries and doughs and freezing them because it saves so much time later.
This looks wonderful was wondering can half just by halving the ingredients? So if I wanted a sweet but I can I substitute salted? I'd like to make the recipe now I have two sticks of sweet and two sticks of salted well then affect the recipe badly? Thank you so much I love your website! I'm sorry the phone to try and send the recipes
So sorry hit the send button I would love to make this would just like to know if I can refrigerate overnight in between layers. If I folded and rolled twice and I'm on the last layer can I refrigerate overnight and then do the final roll and refrigerate again? Thank you so much I truly appreciate your help keep your fingers crossed I'm ready to give up especially if this comes bad
Hi! I used your recipe and made a king cake... It was so good! Not dry like the other cinnamon roll dough types I've made in the past. Thank you! It has been a huge hit! I have a quick question... How long can it be in the fridge before baking? I would like to make the dough ahead to bake a few days later. Is that possible? Or would you recommend baking the next day?
I'm so glad you enjoyed it, Leslie. It should be good in the fridge for up to 3 days.
I have decided to be extremely daring and attempt this dough. The main reason is because I love the mini cheese danish from Wegmans our upscale supermarket however they are ridiculously expensive. I am I'm very very new to yeast doughs. One recipe is now my go-to and it contains potatoes, one was as hard as a rock,
Hey Olga,
Thank you so much for this recipe! I've wanted to make puff pastry dough for quite a while but the few videos I saw made it seem far too intimidating. I wanted to make pizza recently but didn't have a good dough recipe. It would always turn out a bit too dense, like a sort of bread but I wanted something light and airy but still somewhat resembling pizza dough. So my conclusion was to have puff pastry meet yeast and so I googled it. And what do you know, such a thing exists! The first link I saw was yours and so I decided to try it. Since I wanted it for a savory dish, I decreased the sugar content to just a teaspoon. I also cut the recipe in half since it was my first time making it. I made pizza-style hors d'oeuvres and they were just divine! Will definitely be trying out more recipes from you.
Hi Olga! Which dough (danish or quick puff pastry) works better for napoleon cake? And please post your napoleon cake version (I am sure you have one).:) Thank you for wonderful and tasty recipes. I hope also that you and your baby are well. God bless you and your family!
Hi Olga, this is an amazing and surprisingly easy recipe!! I am so so excited! My mother in law to be is a wonderful Swedish woman who loves her Kringle! And this makes a lovely version. Thank you for taking the time to post this, the pictures were very helpful for me, after working all day it was much easier to have a visual. I had no issues what so ever, it rose beautifully and was flakey and perfect, everyone says its just like from a bakery! I will use this to make croissants too!
Take care,
Nancy
I am so happy to read your comment, Nancy. It's awesome that it turned out well for you! I'm thrilled that everyone enjoyed it.