Home › Forums › Chesed › Home-made challah › Reply To: Home-made challah
I feel bad that the OP has not gotten a real recipe, so I will give mine for sweet, whole wheat egg challah (original recipe was for regular flour, but I switched to 80% WW and can’t tell the difference. actually, family likes it better).
Caveat: this works great in Israel, but from experience I have found that for some strange reason, converting between recipes in the US and Israel doesn’t always work- either flour is different, or climate affects rising, or something else makes a difference.
Hope I remember this by heart correctly- but it has to be more on target than DovidBT’s “recipe”
2 bags 1 kilo 80% pre-sifted whole wheat flour (or 14 cups regular flour)
2 c sugar
2 tbsp sugar
mix together and make well
Add to well:
4 Tbsp dry yeast
1 Tbsp sugar
1 cup warm water
Wait at least 10 min, until it gets very bubbly
Add 4 eggs
1 C oil
2 1/4-1/2 water- start with less and add if needed.
Knead well.
Cover and let rise in warm spot 1 hour. Punch down and let rise another hour.
Shape into challahs, brush with beaten egg and let rise again 1h.
bake for about 30-40 min at 180C (350F) depending on size of challahs, until golden brown on top.
Note: this recipe is large enough to take challa with a brocha, but too large to fit into one mixer bowl. I divide it into 2 bowls, kneed each with dough hook, and then transfer both to a large basin, kneed the batches together by hand so it becomes one and then let rise.
Note: for especially fluffy challah, particularly for WW, I read that one should add dough enhancer. I don’t have a commercial one so instead I improvise and use things I already have in the house- a pinch of ginger and about 1 Tbsp of potato starch, and I really see a difference!