I've been exploring different Christmas fare in Singapore, and found that Marks & Spencer had a range of Christmas pastries including mince pies and Christmas stollens. In particular, I was curious about their Cherry & Amaretto Stollen Bites, because there's not a lot of different stollen flavours around. Also, there's not a lot of places where you can get small pieces of stollen rather than buying the entire huge loaf. (I forgot to take a picture of the wrapper before tearing it open, but the screenshot from the M&S online store shows the packaging.)
I had no regrets trying this because it turned out to be a real eye opener in pairing tastes.
It turned out that the cherry and amaretto taste was extremely well paired with the marzipan and blended in very well. The floral rose-like cherry taste ended up enhancing the rose and cherry notes of the usual marzipan, so the cherry did not stand out as a separate kind of taste. I did not notice any sourness or tartness in the mix either, so it was really like an original flavour stollen with a very well-rounded and full marzipan taste. I note in the ingredients list below that they did use sour cherries, but maybe the sweetness just overwhelmed everything else.
The amaretto was very faint and provided just a hint of depth, complexity and warmth to the marzipan.
So in terms of the taste, overall, it was an excellent pairing of cherry, amaretto and nutty marzipan.
Overall review as a Christmas stollen
While it was educational, it was definitely not my favourite, however. Firstly, it was way too sweet. Between the tonnes of icing sugar they coat on top and the thick wad of marzipan inside, it was sweeter than a full-sugar fudge brownie. As you can see from the picture above, it was about half bread/cake and half marzipan. I think a good stollen should have a lot more bread and the marzipan should just be a complement, not the main part of it.
Secondly, because of the huge chunk of marzipan in the middle, the texture was overall more like, as mentioned, a gooey fudge brownie, which is not what I'm looking for in a traditional European Christmas bread. I much prefer the more substantial and firmer German bread texture.
Thirdly, because of the marzipan again, the Christmas spices were not prominent enough.
Overall, if you love something traditional and complex, this is really not recommended. Just try it once to understand how the cherry complements the marzipan.
But if you love super sweet gooey fare like fudge brownies, pure marzipan slabs, fudge slabs or very sweet fudgey soft cookies, you might like this. It has some alcohol though (see the ingredients list below - click image to enlarge) because they use real amaretto. It is just a trace at around 2%, but still something to watch out for.
Compared to original flavour
A side note is that I also did try the Marks and Spencer original flavour stollen, in the form of full slices (screenshot from the online store below), and did not like it either.
It had less of a prominent cherry-note marzipan taste, and the overall Christmas fruit blend taste (including citrus notes) was more prominent, but it was just as sweet and candy-fudge-like. It didn't feel like a very traditional Christmas bread at all.
Discover other Christmas and marzipan treats
- DIY Pandoro or Panettone Rusk
- Christmas Pudding Cookies by Crabtree and Evelyn
- Milk Chocolate Gingerbread Digestives
- Toffee Hazelnut Oat Latte by Luckin Coffee
- Eggnog Chai Tea Latte - Fuss-Free Home-Improvised Festive Drink
- Pistachio and citrus marzipans from Europe by Maison Adam
- More Marzipan Galore: Peanut, Hazelnut, Strawberry and Other Flavours
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