Continuing my soft bread making laboratory, this time I made this beautiful braided bread.
Having some fresh thyme at home, I was thinking to make some bread with it. I found some recipe online using Rosemary or mixed herbs, but I decided to combined a few recipe, and created my personal one, which ends up smelling super great and taste super delicious!
This is a combination of the Greek Easter Bread (Tsoureki) and mixed herb soft bread recipe. In the beginning I would like to make a bigger loaf of bread or even 2, but…when I start preparing the ingredients, I realize we don’t have enough yeast at home. So just let it be, and use what we had.
Rolling the dough into 3 ropes
Braiding the bread
Brushing egg wash on the dough
Looks so soft and smells so great!
Make 1 loaf
Preparation time: 3 hours (including time for the dough to raise)
Baking time: 20 mins
Ingredients:
- 250 g All purpose flour
- 10.5 g Dry instant yeast
- 63 mL Milk
- 1 large Egg + 1 egg more for brushing
- 38 g Butter + 10 g more for brushing
- 50 g Water (lukewarm)
- 5 g Salt
- 7.5 g Sugar
- 5 g Garlic Powder
- Dried Herbs (I used Oregano and Rosemary this time)
- Fresh thymes
1. Prepare the dry ingredients
Put flour, yeast, garlic powder, pinch of dried herbs and salt in a large mixing bowl, mix well, and form a well in the center of the mixture.
2. Mix the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients with an electric mixer
Add milk, egg, sugar and the lukewarm water into the dry ingredients, mix with an electric mixer (with the dough hook), until soft dough forms. (I used the electric mixer for 3-4 mins, and then start kneading the dough a bit with my hands.)
3. Add butter to the dough
Add butter little at a time, mix until a smooth soft dough forms.
4. Wait for the dough to rise
Lightly brush some butter on a bowl, put the dough inside. Cover with a clean wet cloth or plastic wrap. Place in the warmest place of your home wait for 1 hour or until its size doubled.
5. Shape the dough
Push the air out from the dough. and divide the dough into 3 equal parts. Sprinkle some flour on the working surface, roll and shape the dough into 3 equal ropes. (The ropes don’t have to look exactly the same or perfect. In the end, it will still raise a bit more…) On the baking trays, put a baking paper on top. Put the 3 ropes on the baking paper, and stick one end of the 3 ropes together, then start doing a simple braid. Finish the braid by putting the other end of the 3 ropes together as well. Cover the dough with the wet cloth again, and wait for another 45 mins.
6. Preheat the oven and prepare the egg wash
Turn the oven to 180 degrees and beat an egg for the egg wash.
7. Brush the egg wash and put the dough into the oven
Brush the egg wash over the dough, and put the dough into the oven. The dough has to stay there for the next 20 mins.
8. Prepare and brush the herb butter
Melt the butter and put some fresh thyme in it. When the bread is ready, brush a layer of herb butter on top to give a shiny glossy look.
If you want to make more, just doubled the recipe, it will work the same.