Cheap brioche

There’s this really cool bread baking book that’s been gathering dust in my bookshelf for way too long.  If you’re a bread making affectionado, you’ve heard of the bread baker apprentice for sure.  It offers three different versions of the brioche loaf with titles like: pore man’s brioche, middle class brioche and rich man brioche.  What’s being presented, today, is an adaptation of the recipe that is lower in eggs and butter content hence the title of this post: cheap brioche.

Don’t get too excited yet, this is still a pretty caloric bread but it is so worth every bit of sweat and every pieces of  butter you’ll be putting in to it.  The process is a little longer than a regular bread but it’s mostly proofing time.  If you wanted to try something easier, there’s this old recipe for knotted bread that’s pretty decent and this one made with sourdough and pretty fast.

This recipe was also created before I officially converted myself back to the metric system so it’s using cups and teaspoons but, in the future, I’ll make the conversion and update this page.  Happy bread baking everyone, it’s the perfect activity to do on a lazy Saturday.

5.0 from 1 reviews

Cheap brioche

 

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Prep time

3 hours 20 mins

Cook time

45 mins

Total time

4 hours 5 mins

 

Author: ZestyandSpicy.com

Recipe type: Bread

Cuisine: French

Serves: 1 bread

Ingredients

• For the sponge:
• 1½ teaspoon of active dried yeast
• ⅔ cup of lukewarm water
• ⅔ cup of all purpose flour
• 
  
• For the bread:
• 3 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons of cane sugar
• Salt to taste - I usually put about ½ teaspoon worth
• ¼ cup of salted butter - room temp.
• 2⅓ cup of all purpose flour

Instructions

1. - Start by making the sponge. In a m mixing bowl or in the bowl of the stand mixer, add the active dried yeast, lukewarm water & all purpose flour. Whisk together and let it stand for 20+ minutes or until it has created a bubbly and foamy texture.
2. - Add the eggs, the sugar and the salt. Mix well.
3. - Start adding 1 cup of the all purpose flour and you can either mix it well with a hand blender, with a whisk or with the stand mixer. Make clump free paste.
4. - Alternatively, add the remaining 1⅓ cup of flour and the butter.
5. - Knead the dough until it's very soft, silky and uniform. This is where the stand mixer with the hook attachment is very useful because you end up with the softest dough ever but, it's absolutely possible to knead it by hand and get outstanding results. Give yourself a m minimum of 6-8 minutes of kneading and the dough should be good by then.
6. - Prepare a gladdest bowl and add a bit if oil at the bottom. If you used the stand mixer, the dough will be SUPER soft and you'll need to oil your hands in order to detach the dough from the bowl. If you kneaded the dough by hand, it's probably a little harder and simply transfer your boule in a greased bowl. Let rise, covered, in the fridge for two hours.
7. - Shape the loaf and transfer it in a greased and floured glass loaf pan.
8. - Let rise for another hour. At the 30 minute mark, pre-heat your oven at 350.
9. - Brush the top with an egg wash and bake for 45 minutes.

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