Making Mämmi the Easy Way

It was Easter a week ago, and continuing the series of Finnish foods, I decided to make some mämmi. For those unfamiliar, this is a traditional Easter dessert made mainly from rye malt and flour.

Normally you do this in the oven for a la Though it wouldn't be me, if I wouldn't try to make the life simpler by using modern tools. Sous vide water baths are very good at keeping a consistent temperature, so I thought this might work. Googling around I wasn't the first person, and I based my attempt on the article on Utelias kokkin blog.

To take it from there, here is my first iteration of how to make mämmi. Note that this didn't turn out as black as store-bought mämmi. My guess is that this is because I didn't add any dark sugar syrup, which seems to be a common ingredient to add. Also it takes basically half a day to make, but most of this time is waiting.

Ingredients

• 150g rye malt (I used Seitenbacher Backmalz)
• 225g wholegrain rye flour
• 450g water
• orange zest (normally bitter orange peel is used)
• to serve: heavy cream or vanilla sauce

Tools

• oven
• scale
• sous vide device
• ovenproof dish
• pot
• sieve (optional)
• Microplane to zest the orange

Step 1: Mixing the Ingredients

Mix the rye malt, flour and water. Make sure there are no lumps. The easiest way to do this is to pass the mixture through a fine sieve.

Step 2: Sous Vide

Heat your water bath first to 67°C degrees and keep the mixture there for around 3 hours. Then raise it to 73°C for another 30 minutes.

Taste the mixture at this point. It should be realtavily sweet as the enzymes in the malt have converted some of the starch into sugar. I wonder if increasing the duration by a couple more hours is worth it to get more sweetness out of it or if 3 hours are plenty.

Step 3: Boiling and adding Orange Zest

Pour the mixture into a pot, bring to a boil and simmer on a medium heat for about 10 minutes. I then added the orange zest to the mixture.

Step 4: Baking

Bake in an ovenproof dish for about 3 hours. Stir every 30 minutes or so to prevent hard layer forming on the top. Remove the mämmi from the oven when it has reached the desired consistency. It shouldn't be runny, but it shouldn't be too thick either, as it thickens as it cools.

Step 5: Cooling and Serving

I would allow the Mämmi to come to room temperature before serving. Then serve with cream, vanilla sauce or whatever you like. It should keep in the fridge for a few days.

Give it a try!