June 23, 2015 - 7:49am
Challah recipes - effect of eggs.
I've been bakiing challahs for a long time, and recently (since buying Maggie Glezer's book A Blessing of Bread) I've been experimenting with the ingredients.
I used to use a sort of brioche recipe, sometimes using wholemeal flour, but omitting milk and butter ( to make them pareve) and eggs. Now I'm using honey as per Maggie G., but I find the addition of eggs makes the challahs very dry. I still use veg. oil.
Does anyone else find adding eggs to the dough makes the challahs dry? Perhaps you like them dry?
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will make it more cake like. Don't think it'll dry it out. Challahs are egg breads and not really made with milk or butter. Think of a normal dough enriched with eggs and sweeter.
I'm not going to guess at why your loaves seem dry to you. I do, however, suggest that you seek the pareve recipe for challah in The World of Jewish Cooking by Mark Gils. It makes what I think of as "the perfect challah in everyone's mind". Everyone who's accustomed to challah, that is.
Here's the list of ingredients for his Eier Challah:
5 tsp dry yeast
2 cups water
1/2-3/4 cup honey (or sugar)
3-4 large eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
5 tsp kosher salt
8 cups APF (I used bread flour, not APF)
1 egg, beater, for the glaze
seeds, applied after the glaze, just pre-baking
and the recipe - I'll try that . Not sure about american cups - is 8 cups around a kilogram? 2lbs?
My experience of making bread goes back a long way, well before I started to make challahs. We had got used to rather moist dense sweetish bread, white and wholemeal, So we prefer that texture in challahs.
I know it's slightly different from those that other people make.
I tried Emmanuel Hadjiandreou's recipe and it turned out really nice.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/40218/challah
I work in grams so can't help you with cups. The recipe I tried makes one small Challah so just increase the volume proportionately if you try it.
Your challah in your link looks just like those that I try to make, except I usually put sesame seeds on.
We're living in France at the moment so another problem I have is to obtain suitable bread flour. Whatever they say about french bread, their wheat/flour is nothing like UK or Canadian flour - it's very low in gluten.
I can get imported wholemeal flour though, and also use a french brioche flour which has additives including gluten.
Yes, European flours tend to be lower in gluten. Been having a look for you and a popular brand here, Doves Farm, ships to France for quite cheap. £11 for up to 30kg.
https://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/how-to-use-the-website/delivery/
I'm sure there are other places too.
Strong Organic White Bread Flour https://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/flour-and-ingredients/organic-strong-white-bread-flour-x-15kg/
Strong Organic Wholemeal Bread Flour https://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/flour-and-ingredients/org-strong-wholemeal-flour-x-15kg/
And you can get Khorasan, Spelt, Rye, Emmer etc...