August 30, 2012 - 2:07am
Brioche with eggy smell
Hello,
This morning I baked brioche for the first time. The recipe I used is from Bread bakers apprentice - poor man's brioche. 23 % butter, 39 % eggs, 6 % sugar... I kneaded by hand. Room temp was very high so I kneaded in three sessions placing in the fridge in between.
Baked at 180 C max. 35 min,
The brioche smells and tastes very eggy, like an omlet. Not what I expected.
Is it normal for this kind of bread ?
Axel
Share
I've had the same reaction as you - Peter Reinhart's brioches are quite eggy. I'm not knowledgeable enough to know whether brioche "should" be that way, or if it's just his take on this type of bread. I'm not a fan of the flavor or texture of super-eggy brioches, so now I use Ciril Hitz' formula from Baking Artisan Bread. By comparison, it only has 16.5% egg.
39% of whole eggs or of yolks alone? I would take the percentage of butter and whole eggs to the same value and increase sugar.
make the egg weight and butter weight the same. Did you get enough salt for all those eggs? 2.5% of flour weight?
Brioche is supposed to taste of both egg and butter. Rose Beranbaum's brioche is 66% whole egg, but then the butter ranges from a little below that to a little above it. If you want to reduce the eggy taste, you can replace part of the eggs (or egg whites) with milk or water.
Could be that the dough is not cooking properly. Did it rise well and was there good oven spring? Brioche should triple during the proof and almost double in the bake.. Was the texture dense or light and springy? Did you let it cool fully before cutting into it?
Sorry to ask so many question but it may improper handling and baking that is causing the problem.
I'm basing my theory on the cooking of custards. If cooked too fast or overcooked (scrambled) they become overly eggy in flavour. But in pastry cream you actually cook-out the eggy flavour. Something to think about...