jewish

These are absolutely not the Elephant Ears I grew up with. The Elephant Ears I grew up with were giant platters of fried dough dredged liberally in cinnamon sugar and served terrifyingly hot out of a booth at the local fair. They were awesome but not the sort of thing one would attempt at home unless one had a very large quantity of oil in a very, very large pot. 

Just in time for Cinco de Mayo (OK, not really) -- bakery challah! I'd never made challah before test-baking for this book, and I can't believe I missed out on so many years of this fantastic bread. It's beautiful, it's tasty, it's so much easier than it looks. 

I think I'm going to go all-out with a really snazzy braid this time -- but the braiding directions in the book make it easy. (And watch -- now that I've announced my intentions to the world, I'll have the worst-ever braid. Murphy's Law lives at my house). 

Hope everyone enjoys this one -- 

Kendra

Hi everyone!

Round Two of the the Inside the Jewish Bakery baking challenge is officially under-way. Those of us involved in this challenge are attempting to bake our way through Stan Ginsberg and Norm Berg's excellent and recently-published book "Inside the Jewish Bakery: Recipes and Memories from the Golden Age of Jewish Baking." The challenge is being hosted here at the Fresh Loaf, under the "Challenges" forum header, and will go from this week until the end of July. We'll take an August recess, and come back for the third round in September. 

Babka rocks. 

I will eat it always, now that I have eaten it once. 

This recipe is particularly good. I can say this with certainty, having tried no others and not feeling the need to, since this recipe hits all of my "happy pastry dance" buttons perfectly. 

This is also the last week of Semester One of the challenge. I'll be posting Semester Two within (hopefully) a week to ten days, but Semester Two won't start until early to mid-April. 

Thank you all for your fantastic baking efforts so far -- and enjoy this one!

I think buns have got to be one of the most wonderful things you can do with a bit of dough, and I like them all ways -- sweet, savory, steamed, fried, baked, grilled -- love 'em. They're like the ultimate and original fast food, portable and delicious.