Discussion
My good friend George is of Ukrainian heritage. He was visiting New Jersey and I wanted to make a Ukrainian bread for him. I had no idea what kinds of breads Ukrainians ate, so I looked in all my bread books. I found precisely one recipe, one for a Ukrainian Sweet Bread in "Cooking with Bon Appetit: Breads," a bread book from 1985. I've used this book for other breads, so the fact that the recipe was in cups of flour didn't bother me a bit -- I knew it would probably work.
It turns out that this is close to a classic babka recipe. It has a lot of butter, some eggs, some sugar and milk. It's very rich and tastes very good.
This recipe is so very simple and easy to make, I wholeheartedly recommend it for beginners and children.
The only difference between this and a classic babka is that a classic babka is made in an upright can and this recipe uses loaf pans. Otherwise, this is a babka.
Recipe
| Ingred |
Ounces |
Grams |
| Butter |
8 ounces |
240 ml |
Recipe states 2 sticks, 1 cup |
| Sugar |
1/2 cup |
120 ml |
| Salt |
1 tsp |
5 ml |
This is for use with salted butter. If you are using unsalted butter, use 2 teaspoons salt |
| Eggs |
3, room temp |
| Milk |
2 cups |
455 ml |
| Dry Yeast |
1/4 ounce |
7 grams |
| Harvest King flour |
36 ounces |
1020 grams |
Recipe states 8 cups |
One egg at room temperature. Beat it to blend it to brush the top of the loaves with.
Method
- Grease three 8 1/2 X 4 1/2 inch pans
- Combine butter, sugar and salt in a mixer bowl and mix for a minute.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
- Bring milk to a boil. Skim top, then let milk cool to 95F-115F / 35C-45C.
- Combine yeast and 1/2 cup / 120 ml of the milk in a small bowl and stir until the yeast dissolves.
- Add the remaining milk and the yeast mixture to the butter mixture with flour, blending slowly and mixing a bit after each addition.
- When all the ingredients are in the bowl, knead for 3-4 minutes. The dough will be smooth and very elastic, but won't be too sticky, because of all the butter.
- Cover the bowl and let ferment in a warm area until doubled in volume, about 2 hours.
- Pour the dough out onto the counter and gently fold the dough. Return the dough to the bowl and let ferment another 45 minutes.
- Remove the dough from the bowl and fold it again. Divide the dough into three pieces, shape them into loaves and place them in the pans.
- Heat the oven to 325F / 165C.
- After the dough has risen for 30 minutes, brush the tops with the beaten egg.
- Let the loaves rise until the dough approaches the rim of the pan. This will take about an hour.
- Brush the tops of the loaves with the egg and put the loaves into the oven.
- Bake for 30 minutes, then shift the loaves around.
- Bake until the loaves are a dark golden color, about 60 minutes total.
- Remove the loaves from the oven and let them cool for 10 minutes before removing them from the pans.
- This bread is best eaten the next day, but who can wait?
Here we go
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