Bear claw

Bear claw

Type	Pastry, doughnut or fritter
Place of origin	United States
Main ingredients	Dough, almond paste
Ingredients generally used	Raisins
Media: Bear claw

A bear claw is a sweet, yeast-raised pastry, a type of Danish, originating in the United States during the mid-1910s.^[1][2][3][4] In Denmark, a bear claw is referred to as a kam.^[5] France also has an alternate version of that pastry: patte d'ours (meaning bear paw), created in 1982 in the Alps. The name bear claw as used for a pastry is first attested in March 1914 by the Geibel German Bakery,^[1] located at 915 K Street in downtown Sacramento.^[6][7] The phrase is more common in Western American English,^[8] and is included in the U.S. Regional Dialect Survey Results, Question #87, "Do you use the term 'bear claw' for a kind of pastry?"^[9]

Ingredients and shape

Most Danishes include the same basic ingredients such as eggs, yeast, flour, milk, sugar, and butter.^[5] The bear claw is also made with "sweet dough" which is "bread dough with more shortening than usual".^[10] One of the differences between most Danishes, besides taste, is seen in their shape.^[5] A bear claw is usually filled with almond paste,^[11] and sometimes raisins, and often shaped in a semicircle with slices along the curved edge, or rectangular with partial slices along one side.^[12] As the dough rises, the sections separate, evoking the shape of a bear's toes, hence the name.^[13] A bear claw may also be a yeast doughnut in a shape similar to that of the pastry.^[13] Such doughnuts may have an apple pie-style filling, or other fillings such as butter pecan, dates, cream cheese, grape or cherry.

Production

A bear claw can be made by hand or by machine.^[14] Bear claw can be hand-made by using a bear claw cutter that was invented in 1950 by James Fennell.^[15] A 1948 patent describes the process of assembling the bear claw as rolling out the dough, layering filling onto it, folding the dough over, cutting small incisions to create the claw-like look, and finally cutting the dough into separate pastries.^[14] The pastry can be curved into a half-circle at this point, which causes the "toes" to separate.^[16]

Health and nutrition

Similar to other pastries, the bear claw is typically high in carbohydrates and fats. Example nutrition information can be seen from a version produced by the restaurant chain Panera Bread.^[17]

See also

• Banket (pastry) - An almond-stuffed pastry from the Netherlands
• List of almond dishes
• List of pastries
• List of regional dishes of the United States
•  Food portal

References

This page was last edited on 26 November 2023, at 05:42