Torah Explorers

Another week, another challah. Our oldest, Molly, chose the recipe for this week.  She looked through several cookbooks and when she seemed uninspired we turned to the internet. We checked the food network site www.foodnetwork.com  It had three pages of challah recipes but after closer inspection listed just a few recipes to actually make bread but dozens of recipes that required challah. I’ll be placing it in my favorites as a good site to check out when we’ve got an extra loaf or leftovers on hand. She came across a simple recipe that received lots of positive reviews. When she saw melted butter in the ingredient list she was sold. This is how we came to bake Caprial Pence’s Bistro Challah Bread from the show "Cooking Live" .

It was extremely simple to prepare as it requires only five minutes of kneading and one rise making it ideal for a novice and for preparing after work or after-school. It felt good to mix and knead again after last week’s mixer recipe and the dough felt promising- smooth and satiny. I actually made my husband touch it. Though the recipe suggested I "form it into a loaf and place in a greased loaf pan" and no mention was made of an egg wash, I quickly rolled out 4 very long snakes- high marks for not being sticky, braided a four strand braid and brushed it with egg-wash. This cut the baking time significantly and produced a "gi-normous" braided challah- easily 18" long. That would have to be one giant loaf pan! Another first- I sprinkled the baking sheet with cornmeal. This is a method suggested in several other recipes which not only kept the loaf from sticking but gave the bottom of the bread a professional bakery look. Molly was very impressed. There were oohs and aahs when I carried it in to the dining room and the blessings were sung a little bit more quickly as the room filled with the scent of very warm bread.

Family reviews were "Delicious, delicious, delicious. My favorite one…besides Mimi’s challah and the monkey bread." "It was spectacular." "It was so good."

My review: It was easy to prepare and the short prep time meant we could bake it this afternoon and enjoy it hot out of the oven- a real treat. The dough was remarkably not sticky making it easy to roll out and braid. The end result was very light and airy, big and beautiful. It looks like we’ll get a chance to try out one of those leftover recipes this week.

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