Traditional Challah Bread | Easy recipe for Challah Bread

Challah recipe with step-by-step Video. A soft, and pillowy bread you’d want to eat every day. Rich egg yolk enriched dough which doesn’t even require much kneading making it a super easy bread to make

How to make this bread:

The dough:

Let’s go to how to do it. In a big bowl preferably one that comes with a lid, add 205ml of lukewarm water and 7g of Instant Yeast and give it a quick mix.

Separate 6 medium eggs into whites and yolks. Cover and reserve the egg whites in the refrigerator.

Add the yolks, 75g sugar, 35 ml oil at one go to the yeast. Using a wire whisk, whisk until you break down the yolks. Use any vegetable oil that you like, I used a mix of Coconut Oil, Groundnut Oil, and Olive Oil, talk about flavor!

Add 1/2 tbsp of pure vanilla extract and give it a quick whisk.

In another bowl, whisk together 9g of salt and 460g of all-purpose flour. Thoroughly mix it together.

Transfer the flour to the wet ingredients. Using a wooden spoon or a spatula, mix it together by gently folding it until it comes together. Cover the bowl with a lid or cling film and rest for 5 minutes. This resting time allows the flour to relax and encourage gluten development.

After 5 minutes, open the bowl and mix using the same spatula. Continue mixing for about 2 minutes.

Sprinkle some flour from the 20g extra flour onto a working surface such as a wooden plank or your kitchen counter. Ensure the surface is clean and dry, we’re gonna be doing a lot of kneading on it.

Transfer the dough on this surface. Sprinkle flour as needed and gently knead until the dough is very soft, it takes about 5 minutes. At this point, the dough will not be sticky as compared to before. Alternatively, if you have a stand mixer, using the dough hook mix for 2 minutes.

Oil the bowl you used earlier or another clean bowl. Place the dough in the bowl and cover it with a lid or cling film. Let it rise until it doubles in volume, it takes about 1.5 to 2 hours in cool tropical weather. It takes even less when placed near an oven or a stove. So, take care to check on your dough to see if it has doubled.

Kneading:

Once the dough has doubled, open the lid and punch it down gently with your hands.

Flour a work surface and place the dough on it. Divided the dough into two portions; each portion makes one loaf of bread. Set one portion back in the bowl and keep it covered.

Braiding:

With one portion on the counter, divide it further down into 4 parts or 3 PARTS. Use can use a pastry cutter or a simple knife for this. Shape each part of dough into long strands.

If going with 3 strands, join the strands at the top and go ahead with braiding it just like you braid hair. Once done, press together the ends at the bottom and tuck it underneath.

You can place both the loaves in one pan if you pan is big enough. Otherwise, bake one first and let the other braided Challah dough rest meanwhile.

Egg Wash:

For the egg wash mix together 2 tbsp of Egg Whites and 4 tbsp of water. Beat it together. This would be enough for two loaves.

Baking:

Before putting it into the oven, brush the braided Challah dough with egg wash. Then, top it with a mix of sesame seeds and poppy seeds.

Preheat oven at 170 C for 10 minutes. Place the Challah dough in the middle rack and bake it for 20-30 minutes until the bottom is golden brown and a quick tap on it sounds hollow. During the last 5 minutes, turn the oven setting to broil mode to brown the top of the Challah. If you have a kitchen thermometer, the internal temperature should be 190 C. (I use an infrared thermometer in “House” setting, it seems to give me an approximate reading, LOL)

Remove from the oven and IMMEDIATELY cover it with a kitchen towel. Let it completely cool down.

Enjoy it with a bit of jam or make a French toast from the Challah Bread, you’ll fall in love!