The Original Dresdner Christstollen - a Culinary Ambassador for Christmas in Germany

(Source: Dresden Marketing Board)

The Dresdner Christstollen has become a symbol of German Christmas. It is a piece of cultural history, a centuries-old baking tradition, a prevailing passion and, above all, a delicious treat. For centuries, Dresden's bakers and pastry makers have kept up this tradition, passing it on from generation to generation. That and the unique combination of selected ingredients are the secret behind that inimitable stollen taste.

Dresdner Christstollen is only produced in about 120 bakeries and pastry shops in and around Dresden. The original Dresden Christstollen is a raisin stollen that can be recognized by its golden seal of quality.

How a Dresdner Christstollen is Baked

Raisins, butter, sweet and bitter almonds, candied orange and lemon peel, flour, water and yeast are required to be ingredients of the dough. Also, whole milk or whole milk powder, crystal sugar, clarified butter, lemon zest, table salt, powder sugar, stollen spices and spirits are in the laid down recipe of the Stollen Association. An addition of margarine or artificial preservatives and flavors is not allowed. Inspite of the rules for the basic recipe for making Original Dresden Christstollen, each master baker and cake-maker has his own family secret passed down from one generation to the next. A high degree of skill, carefully selected ingredients from far-away lands, along with mysterious spices are combined in a masterful bakery product.

From a fasting bread to a sweet delight

The tradition of baking 'Christstollen’ in Dresden is a very old one. Historians have traced this noble delicacy back to about the year 1400. The Stollen is mentioned for the first time in 1474 in the accounts of the Christian Hospital of St. Bartholomew in Dresden where it is referred to as a cake for the fasting period, consisting of only flour, oats and water as required by Church dogma.

However, without butter and milk the Stollen, also called Striezel, was rather tasteless. Therefore, Elector Ernst of Saxony and his brother Albrecht asked the Pope to revoke the ban on butter. The Holy Father softened his attitude and sent back what is known as the “Butter Letter” stating that milk and butter could be used in the Stollen with a clear conscience and God’s blessing, subject to a penance payment.

The connection with Germany's oldest Christmas Market

The Striezelmarkt, Dresden’s Christmas market whose name also relates to the traditional cake, was mentioned in the chronicles for the first time in 1474. After 1560 the bakers of Dresden gave the ruler of Saxony a Christmas gift consisting of one or two Stollen weighing 36 pounds each. It was carried to the Palace by eight master bakers and eight journeymen. This custom was continued for a long time. In 1730 Augustus the Strong outdid all that had gone before. He had the Bakers' Guild of Dresden make a giant Stollen weighing 1.8 tonnes for about 24,000 guests taking part in the festivities at the Zeithain ‘campement’. This event is commemorated in the 'Stollenfest’held each December in Dresden.

Proven Quality with a golden seal

The quality of the Dresden Christstollen as it is known today only developed in the course of the twentieth century as a result of the increasing prosperity and the use of high-quality ingredients. Already before the second world war, it was sent all around the world, sealed in tin boxes.

In the year 1900, the commercial producers of “Dresdner Stollen” set up a group to represent their joint interests. This was called the Schutzverband Dresdner Stollen e.V.” and guarantees to the consumer the consistent quality of the Dresden Stollen, as testified by a quality certificate, an oval seal showing the individual manufacturer's registration and the words “Dresdner Stollen Schutzverband e.V.”(www.dresdnerstollen.com)

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Christoph.Muench@marketing.dresden.de