Brioche

This buttery French bread loaded with eggs is a classic that is best made as a braided loaf. This is a great bread to have with jam or to use as an appetizer crust. I like to make small puffs with this dough wrapped around sausage that I serve as an hors d’oeuvre. There are many ways to bake brioche but my favorite is to take three long strands of dough and braid them into a loaf.

It takes two days to make this bread, but it’s worth the wait.

Ingredients

• 600 g flour
• 16 g water
• 73 g sugar
• 380 g eggs ~7 eggs
• 14 g Kosher salt
• 8 g dry yeast
• 240 g butter

Process

1. Activate Yeast:
   1. Add dry yeast to water warmed to ~90 deg. F.
   2. Sprinkle a little of the sugar on top and stir.
   3. Let stand for ten mins to activate the yeast.
2. Make dough
   1. In a mixer with a bread hook, add the flour and sugar, then on one side of the bowl add the salt. On the other side of the bowl place the yeast mixture. If you add the yeast on top of the salt you’ll stunt the yeast. mix 2 mins at speed #1.
   2. Add eggs and increase speed to medium (#4) for 5 mins.
   3. Add butter and continue mixing until incorporated.
3. 1st Proof:
   1. Place dough in bowl and cover with film.
   2. Let rise (proof) for 1.5 hours at room temperature.
   3. Roll dough out into a long rectangle ~12″ wide and fold the dough at half the length (like closing a book).
   1. Place dough on baking tray, cover with film and put in fridge overnight.
4. Day 2 Make bread
   1. Remove dough from fridge and separate into three equal sections.
   2. Press each section into a rectangle 8″x12″. Fold along the 12″ side 1/3rd the length and then fold the other end over the top. Using your fingers, press the edges in. Then roll out into a long braid by rolling the loaf on the table using both your hands working from the center outward.
   3. Braid the three strands together.
   4. 2nd Proof:
      1. Place loaf on baking tray and cover with film.
      2. Let rise (proof) for 2 hours at 80 deg. F.
      3. With 1 hour to go on the proof, preheat oven to 350 deg F fan.
   1. Bake Bread
      1. If you want a deep brown hard crust, make an egg wash using an egg white and splash of water that you brush on the top of loaf. Skip this for a softer top having a light golden crust.
      2. Bake break 15 mins or until the crust has nice golden finish. You can test doneness by slightly prying open a bread joint in the center.
   2. Place loaf on rack until cool then put in a bread box.