THE TRADITIONAL CHALLAH served at countless Jewish homes on Friday evenings to celebrate the start of the Sabbath is a long oval shape made by braiding strands of dough. Unfortunately, challah dough made with gluten-free ingredients is too soft to braid, but this Jewish ceremonial egg bread does have a nice design when baked in a Bundt pan. The eggs become the dominant flavor, and the dough is just slightly sweetened. Along with brioche, challah is one of my top choices for making French toast and bread pudding because the ingredients in the bread itself add more richness to the dishes.
MAKES 1 LOAF
1 tablespoon/12 g active dry yeast
2 teaspoons/8 g granulated sugar
1 cup/237 ml water, heated to 110° to 115°F/43° to 46°C, divided
1 cup/158 g brown rice flour
1 cup/120 g millet flour
⅔ cup/85 g cornstarch
⅓ cup/42 g tapioca flour
¼ cup/28 g defatted soy flour
1½ teaspoons/13.5 g xanthan gum
½ teaspoon/3 g fine salt
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 large egg yolk, at room temperature
¼ cup/59 ml vegetable oil
3 tablespoons/45 ml honey
Spray the inside of a 9-inch/23 cm Bundt pan with vegetable oil spray.
Combine the yeast, sugar, and ¼ cup/59 ml of the warm water in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and mix well. Set aside for about 10 minutes while the yeast proofs. Combine the rice flour, millet flour, cornstarch, tapioca flour, soy flour, xanthan gum, and salt in a deep mixing bowl and whisk well.
When the yeast looks frothy add the remaining ¾ cup/178 of warm water and the eggs, egg yolk, oil, and honey and mix well. Add the dry ingredients and beat at medium speed until combined. Increase the speed to high and beat the dough for 3 to 5 minutes, or until it has the consistency of a thick but still pourable cake batter.
Scrape the dough into the prepared pan, smooth the top with a rubber spatula dipped in water, and cover the pan with a sheet of oiled plastic wrap or a damp tea towel. Allow the bread to rise in a warm place for 40 to 50 minutes, or until it reaches ½ inch/1.25 cm from the top of the pan.
Preheat the oven to 375°F/190°C toward the end of the rising time.
Covering the loaf loosely with aluminum foil after 30 minutes, bake the bread for 50 to 55 minutes, or until the bread is golden brown, the top is firm, and it has reached an internal temperature of 200°F/93°C on an instant-read thermometer. Remove the bread from the oven and allow it to cool for 30 minutes. Remove it from the loaf pan by running a spatula around the rim and invert it onto a cooling rack to cool completely.
NOTE:
The bread is best the day it is baked, but it can be stored refrigerated, tightly covered with plastic wrap, for up to 2 days.
VARIATION:
• Add ½/72.5 to ¾ cup/109 g of raisins to the dough.
There is no resource as authoritative as anything written by my friend Joan Nathan about Jewish food. We met many years ago in Washington, and her ninety-nine-year-old mother lives in Providence, so I get to see her often. Here’s what she wrote about challah in her award-winning book Jewish Cooking in America (Knopf, 1998).
“There are two words for bread in Hebrew: lechem and challah. Lechem is the everyday bread. . . . Challah is the special, usually white egg bread reserved for the Sabbath. Challah is also the word that refers to the portion of dough set apart for the high priests in the Temple of Jerusalem. One of the three commandments incumbent upon women, ‘taking challah,’ evolved sometime following the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 CE. Following the rising of the dough, women would separate a piece and burn it to remind them of the offerings to the Temple. For nearly two millennia it has symbolically replaced the sacrificial offerings. All challah that is baked today is kosher only if ‘challah has been taken. . . . ’ It was the Eastern European immigrants who put challah on the gastronomical map in the country. In biblical times . . . Sabbath bread was probably more like our present-day pita. Through the ages and as Jews moved to different lands the loaves varied. But only in America could Jews eat challah . . . every day of the week. . . . Elsewhere a round challah at Rosh Hashanah became a symbol of life. Usually the Rosh Hashanah bread is formed in a circle, to signify the desire for a long life. At this point, local traditions diverge. Some people add saffron and raisins to make the bread just a little bit more special than a typical Friday-night loaf. In certain towns of Russia, the round challah was imprinted with the shape of a ladder on top, to symbolize the ascent to God on high. . . . Many challot traditions were lost as a result of the Holocaust or because of Soviet religious suppression. . . . ”