This recipe works well. I halve the recipe, use one package of active dry yeast for 4 1/2 to 5 cups flour and bake it in an angel food pan. Dough should be soft, but not too sticky. I use currants for the dried fruit and the slivered almonds. This bakes up so high it looks like a commercial bread, but tastes homemade.

yeast cake? I couldn't find it anywhere. Can you please suggest an equivalent or substitute? NOTE: Cristina S. thank you for your comment!!! very helpful!!!

I make this almost every year to give to family members and everyone always loves it. It is very gratifying just doing it and the house smells soooo good.

Martha baked it in Bundt Pans, but it can be made in loaf pans too, I did not have three Bundt, so I used two Bundt and a loaf pan and they baked in the same time, had no problem .

I make a very similar Easter Bread, my grandmother was Romanian and it is called Cozonac. I have adapted the recipe - it originally used yeast cake which is the same as the dry yeast only fresh, which is not easy to find in the supermarket. For 8 cups of flour I use 2 1/2 tsp. instant yeast and it works perfectly. I have just baked it and it turned up fine

I made Martha's Chocolate Babkas found in her Baking Handbook for my Aunt's 97th birthday party. The receipe for the topping is in that book. 1 2/3 cup confectioners sugar, 1 1/3 cup AP flour, 1 1/2 sticks room temp butter, combine sugar and flour then cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. This makes alot of topping so use what you need and freeze the rest. I have used some of it on banana nut bread. In our supermarkets cake yeast is found in the dairy section.

Yeast cake is not easily found in the mid west, even in NY where i lived for 17 years it was hard to find. At least when a lesser used product is part of a recipe PLEASE let us know what the equivilent would be in a more popular product ex: package yeast. Too bad someone did not do their homework to match the old footage to the recipe posted.

where can i buy the yeast cake? can i use the dry yeast in those packages?

I came on here so I could make this, but this is definitely not the same recipe that was on the show today. The topping is supposedly the best part, so why wouldn't the right recipe be posted???

Where's the crumb topping? Is this Martha's mom's recipe?