Brioche

A dough with its own weight in butter, beaten until it leaves the bowl before any butter goes in, and chilled overnight.

Egg. Vegetarian, but not vegan — contains egg, dairy (butter), dairy (milk).

Ingredients

• 500 g strong white flour
• 60 g caster sugar
• 12 g salt
• 10 g fast-action yeast
• 6 eggs, cold
• 60 ml cold milk
• 300 g cold butter, in small pieces
• 1 egg beaten with a splash of milk, to glaze

Method

1. THE DOUGH IS BEATEN UNTIL IT LEAVES THE BOWL BEFORE ANY BUTTER GOES IN. Ten minutes in a mixer, until it is elastic and pulls away from the sides in one mass. Butter added to an undeveloped dough coats the flour and stops gluten forming at all, and what comes out is a rich heavy cake rather than bread. The order is not negotiable.
2. THEN THE BUTTER GOES IN A FEW PIECES AT A TIME and the dough falls apart each time and comes back. It will look wrong -- sloppy, curdled, hopeless -- for most of the process. Keep going; it comes together at the end and is silky.
3. EVERYTHING IS COLD, which is the opposite of most bread. A warm brioche dough is a soup: the butter melts out and never emulsifies. Cold eggs, cold milk, cold butter, and the bowl into the fridge for twenty minutes if the dough warms past about 24C.
4. AND IT IS CHILLED OVERNIGHT BEFORE SHAPING. Soft dough cannot be shaped at all, and the long cold rise is most of the flavour.
5. Flour, sugar, salt and yeast in a mixer bowl with a dough hook, the salt and yeast kept apart until mixing starts.
6. Eggs and milk added and mixed on low until it comes together, then on medium 10 minutes until it is smooth, elastic and leaves the sides of the bowl.
7. Butter added a few pieces at a time with the mixer running, each lot disappearing before the next, 10 to 12 minutes in all.
8. Beaten a further 5 minutes until the dough is glossy and pulls away from the bowl again.
9. Covered and risen at room temperature 1 hour, then knocked back and into the fridge OVERNIGHT, at least 8 hours.
10. Shaped cold -- into a loaf tin, or as balls in a tin, or the head-on-body shape if you can be bothered.
11. Proved 2 to 3 hours at warm room temperature until puffy and slow to spring back. NOT above 25C or the butter leaves.
12. Glazed carefully -- a heavy hand deflates it -- and baked at 180C for 30 to 35 minutes, covered with foil after 20 if it is browning fast.
13. Cooled completely before cutting. It makes extraordinary toast on the second day.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under France · All recipes