Challah Bread

About a month ago I made my very first Challah bread from a recipe from a club I belong to and the woman who submitted it is Wendy Rusch.

Here is my version same recipe but I added some craisins to mine. I braided it in three braids but next time I will make the braids a little tighter as you can see when it baked the ropes of braids did not show up as well as it should have but what can I say.. it was a first time LOL

This is how it looked as I was ready to put in the oven.

And below is how it looked when I took it out of the oven. I must say it tasted good though!

Ta daaaa!!

Here is the recipe!



Ingredients

1 1/2 c	warm water, 110-120 degrees
1 Tbsp	sugar
2 pkg	yeast
1/2 c	honey
1 Tbsp	oil
4	eggs, room temp
1 1/2 tsp	salt
5 c	flour, plus more
optional	course sea salt, seseame seeds or poppy seeds Directions 1 Combine warm water, sugar and yeast in large mixing bowl. Let stand 5-10 min. Then add in honey, oil, eggs, salt and 5 cups of flour. Turn mixer on with dough hook attachment and mix well, once all mixed together add 1/2c flour at a time with mixer running on low-medium until dough is smooth and pulls away from sides of bowl, then knead with mixer for 4-5 min. In total I added 1 1/2c flour extra, this will vary depending on the humidity levels in your area. Once done kneading, turn into a sprayed or oiled bowl, flip dough over as to coat bother sides, cover with a tea towel and place in warm area to rise. It should rise at least one hr or until doubled in size. 2 Remove towel and punch down, dump onto a lightly floured surface and cut dough into 6 pieces for 2 braids or into 2 if you just want loafs. For loafs, spray to pans and place dough halves into them, cover and let rise 30-45 min. For braids, take 3 pieces of dough, roll stretch and pull into 3 rope shapes, pinch together three ends and tuck under loaf, braid! and pinch together the ends and tuck under, place onto sprayed or greased sheet pan, repeat with rest of dough and place onto same sheet pan. Cover and let rise 30-45 minutes in warm place. 3 Preheat oven to 325. In a small bowl, beat 1 egg with 1T milk and brush over loafs, sprinkle course sea salt or sesame seeds or poppy seeds over top, if desired. You can just do the egg wash and call it good as well! And when oven is preheated place loafs into oven bake 15 min and turn pans around, then bake another 15 to 25 min. until a beautiful brown color...remove from oven, if desired, you can brush melted butter over top. Cool on wire racks. ENJOY!!!