Challah Bread

May's Daring Baker's Challenge was Challah bread. Years ago, my mom and I got some at the Farmer's Market in Halifax and it was absolutely delicious, so I had given that it was this month's challenge, I had to try it.

It turns out making Challah bread isn't as difficult as you would think. In fact, it's pretty easy —just time consuming!

I decided to make Honey White Challah. The recipe below makes two loaves. I halved the recipe to make a single loaf and it turned out perfectly fine.

What you'll need:

1 1/2 cups warm water
1 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp dry active yeast
1/2 cup honey
1 Tbsp oil (I used olive oil)
4 eggs
1 1/2 tsp. salt
5 cups all-purpose flour, plus more as needed
1 egg beaten with 1 tsp water

In a large mixing bowl, combine 1/2 cup of warm water with the sugar and yeast. Let sit for 5 minutes until it's foamy.

Add the remaining water, honey, oil, eggs, salt, and flour to the yeast mixture. Now, knead until smooth and add flour as needed. I kneaded the dough by hand and it took about 10 minutes, but you could also use a mixer with a dough hook. I read somewhere that when you use a mixer with a dough hook, you need to knead the dough for twice as long.

Put some oil on a piece of saran-wrap and rubbed around the inside of a large bowl. Once the dough is smooth, transfer it to the oiled bowl, turning the dough a couple of time to cover it in oil. Place a tea towel over the bowl and let rise until doubled (about 1 1/2 hours). I placed my bowl in the oven (which was turned off).


After the dough has finished rising, punch it down a couple of times and divide it into two sections using one half to make each loaf.

Here comes the fun part: braiding! I felt like a challenge so I did the six-strand braid. Here's a link to the tutorial I used:

Basically, you need to form six balls.

Roll each ball on the counter to form a long "tube". To stretch mine out, I held each end of the tube in my hands and whirled it like a skipping rope. This seemed to work well for me.

Attach one-side of the ends of the tube and spread out the tubes on the counter. To braid, to start with the tube on the left. You take it over two tubes and under one tube, then over two tubes again. Keep repeating, working from left to right. Once you're finished, attached the ends of the tube at the other end.

Form into a nice looking loaf and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Brush the tops of the loaves with egg wash and sprinkle with seeds if you want. I didn't use any seeds, but if I was to make this recipe again, I would probably try sprinkling the loaf with poppy seeds.

Bake the loaves for 30-40 minutes, then cool on wire racks.

Ta-dahhhhh! Now, slice and enjoy as toast with butter and jam, or use for sandwiches. So soft.