WHITE IRON LAKE –A faded and tattered recipe, produced on a manual typewriter, complete with stains and a few hand-written notes, had a simple heading “Walnut Potica.”

That recipe is the basis of a recent Ely Folk School class taught at the home of Mary Louise Icenhour, overlooking White Iron Lake.

Like most recipes, this one is just the first step in trying to master a baking tradition handed down through many generations in Ely. Think of it as a guideline or road map to refer to on the long journey of making potica.

Mary’s mother, Rose Mavetz, used her original recipe to teach Community Education classes in the 1970s and 1980s at Vermilion Community College. Mary has decades of experience in making this Slovenian sweet bread and she passed on that knowledge to five students willing to keep the tradition intact.

Three girls, McKenna Coughlin, 12, and her twin sisters, Rachel and Kate, 10, from Orono, are visiting their aunt, Bebe Lobe, for the summer and staying in a cabin right across the lake. Jan Stockton, and her friend Vicki Ott, of Columbia, Mo., have been visiting the area together for some 30 years and live in Ely for part of the year.

The girls have the tradition in their blood as their Aunt Bebe was “born with potica.” Vicki said she first had to learn how to pronounce it. (Rhymes with pizza.)

“Jan and I look forward to trying this together,” she said.

Class started at 9 a.m. with a recipe review (a lump of lard the size of a walnut?) and a bit of a potica history lesson. They made the yeast dough and set it aside for an hour or so to let it rise and then proceeded to make the walnut filling.

“I like to use local honey when I can get it,” Mary said. “Local honey is about the same price as foreign honey.” Her recipe calls for one and one-half cups of the nectar, along with a cup of sugar, a stick of margarine, “butter is best,” whipping cream, eggs and a couple of pounds of finely ground walnuts.

“I don’t skimp on the ingredients,” she said. “I use about a pound of butter, good light-colored walnuts, 100 percent heavy cream, and good high-protein flour. The combination of these is really an art. You have to get the feeling for the dough. Rolling it is an art.”

As she went through the process, Mary added her own tried and true tips which ultimately prove invaluable for the potica novice. “Use a heavy pan, like an old pressure cooker,” and “just bring it to a slight boil.” The students took turns stirring the honey and butter mixture to get an idea of the preferred consistency of the filling. “This filling is what makes potica, potica,” Mary said.

Vicki asked if Mary ever made a smaller batch. “That’s a good question,” Mary said. “The answer, basically, is ‘no.’ Her recipe will make five loaves about 12 inches long. She said it freezes very well.

Mary pointed out the golden color of the filling.

“If you had cheaper walnuts, it would be darker.”

“Drop in the eggs one at a time and stir in each one. Don’t have it too hot or else the eggs will start to cook too fast.”

“This is barely boiling now, which is good.”

“I’m adding a generous cup of whipping cream.”

“Potica can’t be too rich.”

As the dough was rising and the filling was cooling, Mary took the class out to the porch to prepare the potica cloth. Again, she revealed many more of her tried and true methods and procedures.

“Most Slovenian women use a type of double-woven tablecloth that is hard to come by,” she said. “I have a 100-percent cotton sheet that is only used for my walnut potica. I wash it separately and line dry it. This is important for cleanliness.”

One of the mysteries of potica: “We were fussy about how much flour we added to the dough, but now you want to liberally put flour on the cloth and you want the flour to sink into the cloth,” she said.

Mary uses her grandmother’s square table that she resurrected out of the bunkhouse at the cabin. “I like it because it is sturdy, flat, has no leaves, and is 60-inches long which is perfect for five loaves of potica,” she said. The students worked the flour into the cloth from edge to edge.

When the dough was right, students with rolling pins circled the table with the floured cloth and worked together to roll it out.

“Have at it,” Mary said. “Keep rolling. Lean into it. Hear that air come out? It’s the carbon dioxide from the yeast. My mother’s recipe calls for a rolling pin but there is a point where I give it a little help with my hands.” They prodded the dough to the edges of the table, pulling it and adding flour to keep it from sticking.

“Don’t worry about the holes in the dough,” she said. “One thing about ethnic food is there is a lot of range for error. Make sure it’s not sticking.”

The paste-like walnut filling was added and spread from edge to edge. “It is surprising how resilient the dough is to the scraping and spreading of the filling,” she said.

Mary started on one edge and began to roll the dough. “Now this is where the potica cloth really shines,” she said as she picked up the side of the cloth and allowed gravity to roll the dough onto itself in quick fashion. And just like that, the potica was rolled and ready to rest for 15 minutes before going into the well-buttered baking pans and into the oven for an hour. “The old Slovenes would turn it into a big snail and put it on a tray,” she said. “I like to put it in loaves so it is easier for freezing. Spread another stick of melted butter on the loaves when they come out and let them cool.”

A hint at the bottom of the recipe: “Before freezing, and when potica is well wrapped, let it stand at room temperature for two days to allow flavor to go through.”

Class dismissed.

Potica stamp

One of the first stamps printed in Slovenia after they won their independence from Yugoslavia depicted a picture of potica. “I still write to relatives in Slovenia. I got this on a letter right after independence in 1991,” Mary said.