Houston Ham and Cheese Kolaches
Photo by limeandspoontt
Recipe Overview
| Detail | Information |
|--------|-------------|
| Total Prep & Cook Time (excluding overnight sponge rest) | 2 hours 45 minutes |
| Total Yield | 32 kolaches |
| Servings | 8 |
Ingredients
Sponge
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup warm milk
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs, beaten
1/2 cup butter, melted
Final Dough
1 – 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (adjust amount based on humidity)
1 teaspoon salt
Filling
8 ounces cooked ham, chopped
8 ounces Swiss cheese, shredded
Topping
- 1/4 cup butter, melted
Step-by-Step Directions
Make the overnight sponge: Mix yeast and 2 cups of all-purpose flour in a large bowl. Add the rest of the sponge ingredients, and stir with a spoon until fully combined. Cover and refrigerate overnight (this rest time is not counted in the total cook time above).
Mix the final dough: The next morning, stir the sponge lightly, then mix in the salt. Gradually add flour until a soft dough ball forms. In low humidity, you may only need 1 cup extra flour. In humid climates like Houston, I usually add 1 cup first, then knead in an extra 1/2 cup.
First rest: Let the formed dough ball rest for 20 minutes.
Knead: Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, and knead for 10 minutes, adding small amounts of flour as needed to prevent sticking. The dough should stay fairly loose and easy to work with.
First rise: Place the kneaded dough in a lightly oiled bowl, turning the dough to coat it evenly in oil. Cover and let rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour. While you wait, mix the chopped ham and shredded cheese together for your filling.
Shape and fill: Punch the risen dough down to release air. Divide into 32 equal small balls (the easiest method is cutting the dough in half repeatedly until you have 32 portions). Flatten each ball by hand into a 3-inch circle. Add 1 tablespoon of the ham and cheese mixture to the center, then pull the edges of the dough up around the filling to seal it into a ball. Twist the seam closed tightly—if the seal is loose, your kolaches will burst open in the oven.
Second rise: Place all filled kolaches seam-side down onto two greased baking sheets. Cover and let rise again for 30 minutes. While they rise, preheat your oven to 375°F (190°C).
Bake: Brush the tops of the kolaches with melted butter. Bake 12 to 15 minutes, until light golden brown. Do not let them turn dark brown, that will dry them out. Aim for the same light golden color as biscuits or dinner rolls.
Storage: Baked kolaches can be frozen, then thawed and reheated in the microwave when you’re ready to eat.
Community Reviews
Wow, what an incredible recipe! It’s definitely labor intensive, but so worth every minute of work. My small rolling pin came in perfectly handy here. I used sliced Swiss and deli smoked ham, and only had a couple blowouts, which I’m pretty sure was my sealing technique, not the recipe. The whole house smells amazing while these bake, too. Thank you for sharing this recipe—it’s a keeper!
Delicious! This is only slightly different from the family recipe we got from an old kolache shop just south of Houston (Pasadena, to be exact). Our version adds 1/3 cup sugar, 1/2 teaspoon grated lemon peel, and 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg. I fill mine with all kinds of things: orange marmalade, sweetened cream cheese, plum butter, and sausage and cheese (not all in the same kolache, of course). This ham and cheese version is already going to be a new favorite in our bread basket.
I adapted the filling to make a bacon and cheddar version with this base recipe. After reading other reviews about dough rising issues, I bloomed the yeast in the warm milk before mixing it into the sponge, and it worked perfectly—I got great rise every step of the way. I did have one problem: the bottoms got very dark, almost burnt before I could pull them out, while the tops had no color at all. I’m not sure why that happened, so I’ll lower the oven temperature next time. Even with slightly crunchy bottoms, these are still delicious. I’ve missed Texas kolaches so much, and the flavor is absolutely spot on.
These are amazing! They’re time consuming, but I love testing recipes to see if I can pull them off, so it was fun for me. I did run into an issue: my overnight sponge rose great, but the next two rises didn’t do much. After kneading, it never doubled in size, and they didn’t rise much after filling either. Any tips? They look just like the photo, just a little smaller, lol. But they taste amazing regardless!
These are incredible! I made the sponge last night and finished the recipe this morning. I messed up two things: I added the salt to the sponge instead of the final dough, and I skipped the second rise before baking. They still turned out great! I added mayo and mustard to the ham, and used shredded cheddar instead of Swiss, sprinkling the cheese down first then adding the ham. I got 26 delicious balls of goodness out of the batch. I lived in Houston for 20 years, and we used to get amazing kolaches from Southern Maid Doughnuts. Now I live 40 miles north of Houston, and all the local doughnut shops here just give you a thin slice of ham and mostly bread. Thank you for posting this—this will be my go-to recipe from now on, and I’m already planning to try it with sausage links and cheddar next. Merry Christmas to y’all!
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Recipe Submitted By
I’m a stay-at-home mom with two lovely kids, a wonderful husband, and two hungry roommates. I’m an artist by hobby, and working to turn that into my full-time vocation. grins
Just to let everyone know: after a half-hour discussion, the boys (my husband and roommate) settled on this rating system, and I reserve the right to bump a recipe up or down a half star based on ease of preparation and results. It’s been a couple years since I updated this intro, and in that time, my super picky daughter has grown into a girl who loves California rolls, will try almost anything, and is way less picky than the average 7-year-old around here. My son, at two and a half, asks for salad for lunch then eats the whole thing. He’s a weirdo. :)
We try to be very honest and descriptive with all our reviews, and I really appreciate the same from people reviewing my recipes. Not every family will love every recipe, and sometimes what you don’t like, another family will adore! I also try to be as kind and polite as possible in my reviews—there’s no reason not to be. The only thing that upsets me enough to be rude is when a poorly written recipe forces me to clean up a huge mess.
My Rating System:
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ - "Scout isn’t allowed to make this very often because it is highly addictive and will be inhaled on sight!" Dump cakes, sweet salsa chicken and wasabi peanuts fall in this category.
⭐⭐⭐⭐ - "This is wonderful and we want to make it again fairly often, a new family favorite."
⭐⭐⭐ - "This is good. We would eat it again without any changes, but it's not our favorite."
⭐⭐ - "We did not like this very much, but we would eat it again if served. It would be good if some changes were made. This was really not to our taste."
⭐ - "We would eat this again only with a lot of condiments to mask the taste."
No stars - Means I want to share a comment, but don’t want to assign a rating. This does not mean it is worse than a one-star recipe!
I only post public recipes that I have actually cooked myself, and that my family has enjoyed—all of my shared recipes are at least 3 stars on the scale above. All of my photos posted on forums are hosted on Flickr.
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