Rusks
Rusks are just one of those South African staples. I literally cannot make enough of these! In this post I have loaded two recipes. One is the classic buttermilk rusks and the other is my personal favourite – Muesli rusks!
This muesli rusk recipe is very versatile and you can use any variety of nuts/seeds/dried fruits etc that pleases you. This is my favourite combo, but you can make it your own, just keep the basic volumes and substitute with other mixes.
Buttermilk Rusks
I used Stork bake in my rusks, but you can use butter if you prefer. Buttermilk can be quite pricey so use maas if available, they have the same cultures taste the same.
Buttermilk Rusks
Ingredients
- 2500 ml self raising flour
- 500 ml sugar
- 5 ml salt
- 500 g butter or marg melted
- 3 eggs
- 1 litre buttermilk
Instructions
- Grease a large metal oven tray well or you can use two loaf tins. Preheat oven to 180°C
- In a large bowl, sift together the dry ingredients. Mix the melted butter, eggs and buttermilk. Mix everything together.
- Pour into greased tray and bake for about 1 hour until cooked through. Test that it is cooked by inserting a knife or skewer into the middle, when it comes out clean remove the tray from the oven and set aside to cool.
- Once cool cut into rusks and lay out on oven trays or cooling racks. Keep your sizes even, so that they dry evenly and leave space between the rusks so that the air can circulate. Dry in a cool oven (100°C) for about 4 hours. Check that the rusks are dried through before turning off the heat. Leave to cool and pack in airtight containers.
Muesli Rusks
The orange zest adds a wonderful flavour to the rusks, but can be left out if preferred. If you don’t want nuts either leave out or replace with extra raisins. The coconut adds a lot of crunch, but again if you prefer not to have coconut simply leave it out or add in more oats.
Muesli Rusks
Ingredients
- 1 kg self-raising flour
- 10 ml salt
- 10 ml baking powder
- 500 ml brown sugar or a mix of white and brown sugar
- 250 ml rolled oats
- 250 ml coconut optional
- 750 ml bran flakes
- 250 ml sunflower seeds or any other seeds
- 250 ml raisins optional
- 125 ml nuts optional
- Zest of one orange optional
- 500 g butter or marg melted
- 2 eggs
- 500 ml buttermilk
- 250 ml milk
Instructions
- Grease a large black oven tray well (or use two large loaf tins) and preheat the oven to 180°C
- Place all the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Feel free to play with the additions. Leave out or use up what you have at hand.
- Mix the zest (if using) butter, buttermilk and eggs and add to the dry ingredientsAdd in milk as needed to make it easier to mix (it can be VERY stiff depending on what you add).
- Place the mixture into your prepared tin and bake at 180°C for about an hour. A skewer or knife inserted into the middle should come away clean. Once it is cooked through, remove the tray from the oven and leave to cool
- Once cool cut into rusks and lay on an oven tray or cooling rack and place in a cool oven (100°C) for about 4 hours to dry. Check that they are dry before removing from the oven. The larger your slices are the longer it takes to dry. Try to keep your slices even so that they all dry at the same rate.
- Store in an airtight container.