I love making bread. It is one of my favorite things to bake and one of my families favorite things to eat. I discovered the book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking
last year. I love this book and I have posted about it several times. I love the basic dough in the book and how versatile it is.
But I have another bread/dough from this book that I love and make quite a bit. It is their Challah dough. I use this for Challah, but I also use it for cinnamon rolls, and cinnamon bread. I love the fact that I can make this dough up and use it for several meals throughout the week.
This is so much cheaper and better tasting than store brought bread. Fresh, homemade bread is so good, especially a recipe like this that is so easy and convenient.
My kids love cinnamon rolls or cinnamon bread made with this dough. For cinnamon bread I just roll out about 1/3 of the dough, spread a little butter on it, sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar and roll it up. Seal the ends and tuck them under. Place in a greased loaf pan, let rise about 1 hour and bake at 350 for about 25 minutes. My kids love this toasted for breakfast.
Challah Bread Dough
- 1 3/4 cups lukewarm water
- 1 1/2 tablespoons granulated yeast (2 packets)
- 1 1/2 tablespoons salt
- 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted (or neutral-tasting vegetable oil such as canola), plus more for greasing the cookie sheet
- 7 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- Mixing and storing the dough: Mix the yeast, salt, eggs, honey, and melted butter (or oil) with the water in a 5-quart bowl, or a lidded (not airtight) food container. ( I use a food storage bucket)
- Mix in the flour without kneading, using a spoon, a 14-cup capacity food processor (with dough attachment), or a heavy-duty stand mixer (with dough hook). If you’re not using a machine, you may need to use wet hands to incorporate the last bit of flour.
- Cover (not airtight), and allow to rest at room temperature until the dough rises and collapses (or flattens on top), approximately 2 hours.
- The dough can be used immediately after the initial rise, though it is easier to handle when cold. Refrigerate in a lidded (not airtight) container and use over the next 5 days. Beyond 5 days, freeze in 1-pound portions in an airtight container for up to 4 weeks. Defrost frozen dough overnight in the refrigerator before using. Then allow the usual rest and rise time.
- On baking day, butter or grease a cookie sheet. Dust the surface of the refrigerated dough with flour and cut off a 1-pound (grapefruit-size) piece. Dust the piece with more flour and quickly shape it into a ball by stretching the surface of the dough around to the bottom on all four sides, rotating the ball a quarter-turn as you go.
- Divide the ball into thirds, using a dough scraper or knife. Roll the balls between your hands, stretching, to form each into a long, thin rope. If the dough resists shaping, let it rest for 5 minutes and try again. Braid the ropes, starting from the center and working to one end. Turn the loaf over, rotate it, and braid from the center out to the remaining end. This produces a loaf with a more uniform thickness than when braided from end to end.
- Allow the bread to rest and rise on the prepared cookie sheet for 1 hour and 20 minutes (or just 40 minutes if you’re using fresh, unrefrigerated dough).
- Preheat the oven to 350-degrees F.
- Bake near the center of the oven for about 25 minutes. Smaller or larger loaves will require adjustments in baking time. The challah is done when golden brown, and the braids near the center of the loaf offer resistance to pressure. Due to the fat in the dough, challah will not form a hard, crackling crust.
- Allow to cool before slicing or eating.
For more frugal recipes and ideas see Frugal Fridays and Grocery Cart Challenge.
That sounds tasty! Thanks for sharing!
~Liz
thanks! I have been wanting to try apple challah — now I have the perfect bread dough to do so.
I love the idea about using the dough in a cinnamon bread. I’m thinking of adding raisins too, since I used to love cinnamon raisin bread as a kid. Now I’m going to have to whip up another batch of this dough! I also have used it to make challah and cinnamon rolls.
By the way, I found your site from a link to your comment on the Artisan Bread in Five website.
Have you tried this recipe with any whole wheat flour? If not, do you think it would work to do 1/2 whole wheat, 1/2 all-purpose?
I have not tried it. I would start with only 1/4 or 1/3 wheat and if that works increase it. I hope that helps.
If you brush it with an egg/water mixture, it will form a nice firm an shiny crust that is delicious. Thanks for the recipe.
Wow this sounds great! How did you make the cinnamon version?
I have tried this recipe twice so far and have had to adjust the amount of flour. The first time I thought I miscounted the 7 cups of flour. Had to add another cup after the rising to get it to dough stage. (It was pourable before and after rising.) The second time I measured carefully to make sure I had the correct amount of flour. All ingredients are the same as in the recipe. I had a batter rather than dough. Again I added about an extra cup of flour just to handle it. Others have said it would be hard to incorporate the last bit of the 7 cups of flour. My results are way different. Next time I’m going to start with 8 cups of flour at the beginning and see what happens. BTW, the bread tasted awesome but was a little crumbly the first time. The second batch is in the oven right now.