Vegan Chocolate Rugelach Recipe: two methods

Vegan chocolate rugelach recipe with delicate layers of pastry! This post includes step-by-step pictures of how to make rugelach.

What is rugelach?

Rugelach is a crescent-shaped pastry often pronounced as 'ru-ger-lark' or 'ru-ger-lac'. Even though they look similar to croissants, they are more dense. I'd describe them as a cross between croissants and brioche.

Rugelach recipes seem to have origins in Jewish culture in Europe, particularly Eastern Europe. These days it's very common in Israel (where I tried it) and in the American Jewish communities. In Australia, I personally haven't seen it in shops but my partner (who is half Eastern European) says he grew up with it!

There are two types of rugelach recipes: a yeasted version and a biscuit version. Both usually have a crescent-like shape and filled with chocolate, jams, poppy seeds or nuts. This recipe is for the yeasted version!

This rugelach recipe is:

• Flaky with lots of beautiful layers
• Moist and not too dry, when fresh
• Not too sweet

What ingredients are in this vegan chocolate rugelach recipe?

This yeasted rugelach recipe uses:

• Plain flour
• Cane sugar (make sure it's organic if you're vegan)
• Plant-based milk
• Instant dried yeast
• Plant-based butter
• Cream cheese

The ratios of ingredients are based on my extremely tried and tested recipes of vegan brioche and chocolate babka. I strongly recommend checking out those posts to see what your dough should look like before you assemble your rugelach.

New York's Breads Bakery uses babka dough as the base of their rugelach recipe - I haven't tried their version but in order to create a flaky pastry, I did the same for this! Plus, if you already know a recipe works, stick with it!

If you would like to make cinnamon rugelach, use the butter, sugar and cinnamon filling of my cinnamon babka.

Cream cheese in rugelach recipes?

For this rugelach, I replaced half the butter with cream cheese in my original brioche dough. This makes the dough richer and more like pastry.

Adding cream cheese to the rugelach recipe seems to be an Americanisation of the traditional pastry and a common practice in the Western world. People who grew up with these pastries may think it's a little odd to have cream cheese in the recipe.

However, I think it's similar to how pizza in Italy is very different from pizza in other countries. Or vegan sushi in Japan is nothing like vegan sushi around the world!

Ingredient substitutions for this rugelach recipe

If you don't have all the ingredients at home or you have particular dietary preferences, here are possible substitutions:

• Sugar: To make the rugelach refined sugar free, you can use coconut sugar instead of cane sugar.
• Yeast: I haven't tried this recipe with different types of yeast but if you do, let me know!
• Butter: Can be substituted with oil
• Cream cheese: Can be substituted with butter or oil
• Chocolate: Make a cinnamon sugar filling using the filling of my cinnamon babka.

I've been told that bakeries in Israel often use oil instead of butter in order to make it parve / pareve to accommodate the large Jewish kosher community... sooo using oil instead of butter doesn't make the vegan rugelach less 'authentic'!

How to make chocolate rugelach: Method 1

There are two ways to assemble this rugelach recipe. This first method is easy, quick and results in a slightly layered pastry.

Once you've made and rested your dough, you'll need to shape it! Roll out the dough into a circular shape (like a pizza). Make sure you roll the dough as thinly as possible as it'll give you pastry more delicious layers.

Spread your chocolate ganache to the edges and cut the dough into segments.

Once you've cut your dough, start from the edge and roll up each segment to make little 'snails'.

These vegan chocolate rugelach are elegant, cute and didn't need much effort! Place them on a lined baking tray and let them rest. You've worked with the dough enough and you've worked enough yourself!

How to make chocolate rugelach: Method 2

Using the same rugelach recipe, the second assembly method is more time-consuming. Basically, you 'laminate' or fold layers of chocolate into the dough. It's easy but just takes a bit of time - here are pictures to walk you through the process.

Roll the dough into a long rectangular shape and spread some of the ganache on the bottom two-thirds of the dough. Fold down the top third of dough and cold up the bottom third.

You'll eventually have a 'parcel' which needs to be placed in the fridge to rest and chill.

After it's rested, flatten/roll the dough into a long rectangular shape again. Your dough may quite firm at this stage so consider the rolling 'free exercise'! 

Repeat the spreading/folding steps above. So, spread chocolate ganache on two thirds of the dough and fold. Set aside and chill the dough.

Once you've done that, you need to:

1. Roll out the dough one last time
2. Spread the chocolate ganache on the entire surface
3. Cut into long segments and shape as desired

Laminating the dough results in a super flaky pastry with LOTS of layers! I'm always up for short cuts BUT the second method is well worth the patience and hard work! The pastry is soo much more fun and delicious to eat :).

Rugelach recipe: Method 1 vs Method 2

In the below picture, the left uses 'Method 2' and has many delicate layers. The right uses 'Method 1' and has one distinct layer.

My partner and I prefer eating rugelach using 'Method 2' as there are more layers. However, it takes a lot more time and patience!

Check out my other vegan pastry and bread recipes

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