Greek Easter Bread

Greek Easter bread is braided and contains hard boiled eggs, dyed red for fertility, symbolizing the Resurrection of Christ.

 

A funny thing happened on the way to the family Easter dinner...

I started making this bread Saturday morning to take to my family's Easter celebration that afternoon. I was running late so I decided to let it rise in the car and bake it once I got to my sister's house. I had to hold onto the baking pan to keep the loaf from sliding off. It slid a couple of times and I was able to catch it. I kept saying "will you just cooperate?". It decided to have the last word. It slid completely off the seat. I couldn't catch in time. It stayed on the parchment and was still covered, but it was ruined.

I was soooo mad that I balled the dough up and threw it down on the baking pan. I decided I didn't care. We just wouldn't have any bread for dinner. I kept driving down the road mad at the world. Then, I started laughing my head off at myself.  You can’t get mad at bread. It was then that I realized I could just reshape it and let is rise again. So that's what I did.

The moral of the story is when you think all is lost, it usually isn't. You just need to laugh and try again!

 

Greek Easter Twist
Makes: 2 Loaves
From Breads from Betsy's Kitchen by Betsy Oppenneer.

Ingredients:

• 2 scant tablespoons or 2 (1/4-ounce) package active dry yeast
• 1/2 cup warm water (about 110 degrees)
• 1 cup warm milk (about 110 degrees)
• 1 cup soft butter
• 4 large eggs, beaten
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1 tablespoon crushed anise seed
• 1 tablespoon orange peel
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 6 to 7 cups unbleached flour
• 8 to 12 hard-boiled eggs, dyed bright red
  

Glaze

• 1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water
• Coarse sugar or sesame seeds

 

Preparation:

1) Hard boil 8 to 12 eggs. I used about 8 eggs but you can use more if you like.

2) Dye the eggs red. I've never dyed Easter eggs red before. Very interesting and beautiful!

Directions:

Stir the yeast into warm water in the bowl of a stand mixer. Add the milk, butter, eggs, honey, anise seed, orange peel, salt, and 3 cups flour and beat vigorously for two minutes.

Gradually add in the flour, 1/4 cup a a time, until the dough begins to pull away from the side of the bowl. Turn dough out onto a floured work surface. Knead, adding flour a little at a time, until you have a smooth, elastic dough.

Put dough into an oiled bowl and turn to coat it with oil. Cover with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and let rise until doubled in size, about one hour.



Turn the dough out onto a lightly oiled work surface and divide in four pieces.




Shape each fourth into a 30-inch strand.




Twist strands together and pinch the ends together.





Spread the dough and insert four to six eggs evenly spaced between the strands.  Place onto parchment-lined baking sheets. Repeat with the remaining two strands.




Cover with plastic wrap and let rise until almost doubled, about 45 minutes.

About 10 minutes before baking, preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Just before baking, brush each loaf lightly with the glaze and sprinkle with the coarse sugar or seeds.





Bake for 25 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the loaf reaches 190 degrees. Immediately remove the bread from baking sheets and cool on a wire rack.

This is the loaf I took to my sister's house. It turned out great even though I had to reshape it.




This is the second loaf that I made a couple of days later. I put the dough in the refrigerator and took it out 2 days later and let it rise at room temperature before shaping. It did just fine. It amazes me how forgiving a lot of breads are. We should be more like that!




Happy Baking!
Cathy

Kulich: Russian Easter Bread

Kulich, is a Russian Easter Bread that is usually made with a baba dough, but with more sugar, and added candied peel, almonds, raisins, and saffron. The top is iced and decorated, usually with Cyrillic letters standing for 'Christ is risen'.

"Traditionally during the Easter service, the kulich, which has been put into a basket and decorated with colorful flowers, is blessed by the priest. Leftover kulich that isn't blessed is eaten with Paskha for dessert. Blessed kulich is eaten before breakfast each day. It is baked in tall, cylindrical tins (like coffee or fruit juice tins), and when cooled is decorated with white icing (which is slightly drizzled down the sides), colorful flowers, and XB (the traditional Easter greeting of Христос воскресе, "Christ is Risen") is decorated on the side. Kulich is only eaten during the 40 days after Paskha (Easter) until Pentecost."

 ---This information is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Kulich"

According to Peter Reinhart, Dresden stollen, Milan panettone, Russian kulich, and English hot cross buns can all be made from this same multipurpose holiday bread formula. The difference is in the way the bread is shaped, baked and decorated.

For this version, we'll use the master formula and add dried apricots, almonds, and golden raisins rather than the candied peel and saffron. Then, we'll drizzle the top of the baked bread with a powdered sugar glaze and decorate it with colored sprinkles.

All-Purpose Holiday Bread

Adapted from Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice.

Makes: 1 very large loaf, several small loaves, or up to 24 hot cross buns

This formula utilizes a sponge. The sponge is similar to a poolish except it is made with buttermilk. Although you can use other types of milk, buttermilk gives the dough the best flavor.

Note: After 1 hour of fermentation, you can retard the dough for up to 24 hours.

Ingredients:

Sponge:

• 3/4 cup (3.5 ounces) unbleached bread flour
• 2 teaspoons (0.25 ounce) instant yeast
• 1 cup (8 ounces) buttermilk, at room temperature

Dough:

• 4 1/3 cups (19.5 ounces) unbleached bread flour
• 1/3 cup (2.25 ounces) sugar
• 1 teaspoon (0.25 ounce) salt
• 5 large eggs (8 ounces), cold
• 1/2 cup (4 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
• 11.75 ounces sponge; use all

Additional Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup chopped dried apricots
• 1/2 cup golden raisins
• 1/4 cup rum or orange juice concentrate
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup sliced almonds or walnuts
• 1/4 cup multicolored candy sprinkles
• Cooking spray

Directions:

To make the sponge:

Stir together the flour and yeast in a mixing bowl. Then stir in the buttermilk and mix till smooth. Cover the sponge with plastic wrap and allow it to ferment at room temperature for 1 to 2 hours, till very bubbly.

Soak the dried fruit in rum and/or vanilla in a bowl while the sponge is developing.

To make the dough:

Combine all the other dough ingredients and the sponge in the bowl of a stand mixer with a dough hook. Mix the dough on slow speed for 1 minute, then on medium speed for 5 minutes.

Add the fruit and nut mixture and mix for an additional 2 minutes, or until the dough is soft and tacky. Add water if the dough is too stiff or flour if it is too sticky.

Spray the dough with cooking spray, cover it with plastic wrap, and allow it to rise at room temperature for 60 to 90 minutes. The dough should increases in size by 1 1/2 times.

Forming the Kulich:

This formula makes one large kulich. Generously spray the inside of a clean coffee can or other can with cooking spray. To make a large kulich, you will need a 2-pound coffee can. You can also use smaller cans, such as tuna fish cans to make a bunch of cute baby kulich's if you prefer. Fill each can slightly more than halfway with a ball of dough. Let the dough rise till it comes just above the rim of the can.



The dough may take anywhere from 1 to 3 hours to rise enough, depending on the warmth of the room. I used a 2-pound coffee can. It was a little chilly so it took about 4 hours for the dough to rise.

Baking the Kulich:

Bake the loaf at 325°F till the top begins to brown, 20 to 40 minutes depending on the size. The bread will have crowned above the can and mushroomed slightly over the edge.

The dough that is exposed will bake much faster than the rest of the loaf, so cover the top with aluminum foil and continue to bake it for about 15 minutes longer, till the center reaches 185°F. Turn off the oven and allow it to bake another 5 minutes.




Allow the kulich to cool in the can for about 10 minutes. When it is no longer hot but still warm to the touch, carefully remove the loaf, taking care not to separate the crown from the base (tap the sides of the can if necessary). Cool on rack.



Decorate the crown with lemon or orange sugar glaze (recipe follows), and sprinkle golden raisins, chopped dried apricots, sliced almonds, and/or colorful candy sprinkles into the glaze as it drips down the side of the loaf. Use golden-colored fruit to symbolize Christ's resurrection.


Making the sugar glaze:

Whisk together 1 cup sifted confectioner's sugar and 1 1/2 to 2 tablespoons hot water into a paste that is thick but still can be drizzled on the bread. You can also add a few drops of lemon, orange, vanilla, or almond extract. A thinner sugar glaze can be brushed on by adding a little corn syrup and a few drops of milk.

Some people like to drizzle the glaze from a fork in streaky little lines. Others prefer to brush it on with a pastry brush to coat the whole piece.

Why don’t I have a photo of the finished bread? 

Well, you win some and you lose some. My loaf would not come out of the pan. It seems that using a coffee can is not as foolproof as other methods. I'll have to investigate further and let you know how to avoid the same fate. In the meantime, I have some yummy crumbs and broken pieces of bread that taste really good, but don't make such a pretty picture.

Note: I found a solution to the problem of the loaf sticking in the coffee can after it is baked. You have to get rid of the rim at the top.  To do this, I removed the bottom of the pan using a can opener, then I let the bottom fall to the top so that it was resting on the rim (which was now at the bottom).  If you decide to try this method, please be careful of the rough edges.


Happy Baking!
Cathy

Holiday Pumpkin Bread

This festive Holiday Pumpkin Bread recipe makes two wreaths so keep one wreath for yourself and give one away; or serve one, and make the other into Pumpkin Bread Pudding.

These wreaths also make beautiful centerpieces for your Holiday dinner. I've got company coming for Thanksgiving Dinner so I plan to use one for a centerpiece and the other for bread pudding.

Holiday Pumpkin Bread
The recipe for this moist and tasty golden wreath is courtesy of King Arthur Flour.

Yield: Makes two 8-inch wreaths



Ingredients:

• 2 3/4 cups (11 1/2 ounces) Unbleached All-Purpose Flour*
• 2 cups (8 1/2 ounces) White Wheat Flour*
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/3 cup (2 1/2 ounces) brown sugar
• 1/3 cup (1 5/8 ounces) diced crystallized ginger, optional
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon instant yeast
• 15-ounce can pumpkin
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick, 2 ounces) melted butter or canola oil (1 3/4 ounces)

* You can make this bread completely with all-purpose flour if you prefer.

Directions:
Combine all of the dough ingredients, and mix and knead them—by hand, electric mixer, or bread machine—until you’ve made a smooth, somewhat sticky dough. Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled bowl,

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and set it aside to rise for 1 to 1 1/2 hours. It should have expanded somewhat, but won’t be real puffy.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly greased surface and divide it in half.  Then divide each half into three pieces.

 

 

 

Roll each piece into an 18" log.

 

Working with three logs at a time, make a braid, pinching the ends together.

 

 

Coil the braid into a lightly greased 8" or 9" cake pan, shaping it into a wreath-like circle and pressing the ends together where they meet.

 

 

Repeat with the remaining logs. Cover both pans with lightly greased plastic wrap. Let the wreaths rise for about 90 minutes, until they look puffy, though not doubled in bulk.

Bake the bread in a preheated 350°F oven for 30 minutes, until lightly browned and an instant-read thermometer inserted into the center reads 190"F.

 

Remove the wreaths from the oven, and allow them to cool on a rack.

These wreaths taste great and make beautiful centerpieces.

Happy Baking!
Cathy

 

 

Here are some additional festive bread recipes and resources:

• Festive Recipes
• Roll Recipes
• Pumpkin Bread Recipes