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Every Christmas, my family makes Slovakian kolaches, a sweet roll filled with a vanilla-walnut paste.

My grandma used to mail us a loaf, wrapped in aluminum foil and packed in a shoebox. My mother remembers her grandmother mailing her a loaf, also wrapped in a shoebox. There were a few years where I made them in Texas and mailed them to my brother in Montana and my sister in Alaska. We all have great memories of this treat!

The funny part is, none of us are Slovakian. My great-grandmother passed down a recipe she received from her Slovakian neighbor in rural Pennsylvania. I should dig up the neighbor’s name from census records, and share it in case their descendants ever Google them. (Dear Descendants: your ancestor’s recipe is awesome and our family has been enjoying it every Christmas for the last hundred years.)

This year, my mom and I did an experiment. Because Lurko and I want to eat healthier, I have been trying to make sugar-free versions of my favorite foods. This recipe makes 6 loaves, so Mom made 3 loaves in the traditional sugar-y way (the control group), and I made 3 loaves the sugar-free way (the experimental group).

Now, most recipes that I’ve converted were pretty simple…you substitute 1 part monk fruit for every two parts sugar, so if the recipe calls for one cup sugar, you use 1/2 cup monk fruit. BUT this recipe is a yeast bread, and science says that yeast needs sugar to make the bread rise. Monk fruit is a sweetener that does not have glucose, so yeast will NOT interact with monk fruit. What do we do? 

Well, according to The Internet, we don’t need to do anything. Yeast will interact with the glucose in flour to do its thing….it just works more slowly than sugar so you need to give it extra time to rise. Got it!

Happily, I was able to pull off this sugar-free version successfully. Just note that I had to use regular wheat flour, so this is NOT keto. I’ve tried alternate flours in the past and I just have not been able to make it taste good, so this year I’ll take the win with sugar-free.

Equipment

Most of the time I’ll tell you that you can use whatever equipment you want. For this particular recipe, sure, you can use a food processor and it’ll probably work. But this old-fashioned grinder will give you the pasty consistency that you need for this nut roll filling. (Bonus: you can also use this to make sausage.)

The grinder in the photo is my Mom’s, but I have a newer one that works just as well. Maintenance is fairly simple, after each use just take it apart, wash each piece, dry it carefully, then clean it with food-grade silicone.

Ingredients

Dough:

• 1/2 cup butter or shortening

• 6 tablespoons monk fruit (or your favorite sweetener)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups hot milk
• 2 tablespoons instant yeast dissolved in 1/4 cups warm water
• 6 (or more) cups flour*

Filling:

Grind 2-3 lb walnuts, then add 1 1/2 cups warm milk, 3/4 cup monk fruit, and 1 tablespoons vanilla.

Instructions

1. Cream the butter, monk fruit, salt, and eggs.
2. Add milk and dissolved yeast.
3. Add 6 or more cups flour*. Mix well.
4. Divide into 6 pieces.
5. Roll out dough thin, spread filling.
6. Roll into loaves and bake 350F for 45 min.

*The flour is very variable. We usually start with 5 1/2 cups, and add more if the dough is too sticky. It’s easier to add more than to take it away.

My parents say the sugar-free version tastes just as good as the sugar-full version. Let me know if you try this recipe. Merry Christmas!