Swiss Butter Braid

The typical Sunday breakfast bread of Switzerland, the butterzopf or tresse au beurre was one of the treats I looked forward to every week during my apprenticeship in Zurich in the early 1970s. Armand, the hotel pastry chef, would arrive early every Sunday to prepare the braids. While they were baking, he would invariably become distracted and the bottoms would burn. It became a weekly tradition that some time around eight o’clock every Sunday morning we would hear the raspy s