Rabbi Rob's Challah
Challah (2 regular loaves or 1 very large)
By Rabbi Rob Kvidt and Jeff Tucker
Ingredients:
1 cup warm water
½ cup sugar
1 tablespoon honey
½ cup vegetable oil
2 ½ teaspoons salt
2 eggs
4 1/2 cups flour (bread or higher protein all-purpose)
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
1 egg, beaten
1 tablespoon water
Preparation:
1. Mix well, water, honey, oil, 2 eggs in a bowl, and heat gently to just lukewarm, but not hot.
Tips: Healthier and best tasting oils are avocado, mac nut or peanut. Temperature of combined liquids (just over 100 degrees) is important to activating yeast.
2. A. If using a bread machine: Mix flour, salt, sugar and yeast and place in a bread machine pan. Select dough cycle; press start. B. If not using a bread machine, mix the wet and the dry ingredients, beat well, then switch to using hands then kneading as dough thickens. Knead until smooth, elastic and not sticky, adding flour as needed. Perhaps 5 minutes. Let rise until doubled.
Tips: Any flour will work, but bread flour will work best. I replace up to ⅓ of the flour with fresh ground wheat flour which I grind in a coffee grinder. It makes all the difference. Be sure the yeast is fresh.
3. When done, place dough on a lightly floured surface.
4. For regular loaves, divide dough in half. For a very large loaf, work with the entire quantity.
5. Divide dough into 3 equal pieces. Roll between your hands into ropes about 12 to 14 inches in length, then braid into a loaf. Gently put the loaf on a greased or parchment lined cookie sheet, and cover loosely with plastic wrap or a cover, and let rise for 60 to 90 minutes in a warm, draft-free location, until doubled in size.
Tips: I use an ice chest placed upside down over the cookie sheet instead of plastic wrap to create a near perfect and draft-free proofing environment. Then I place a cup containing steaming hot water next to the bread on the cookie sheet. The steam from the water helps the bread rise even better.
6. Beat together 1 egg and 1 tablespoon water. Gently brush loaf with egg mixture and sprinkle with any seeds desired.
Tips: A pastry brush is great, or a cheap soft bristle paint brush works too. I grind a little coarse salt on the top.
7. Bake in a preheated 350 degrees F oven for about 20 to 30 minutes. It is done when internal temperature reaches 195 degrees F, or when the bottom is well browned and tapping bottom sounds hollow. If bread begins to brown too soon, cover with foil.
Tips: any instant read meat, candy or other thermometer that can register 195-200 degrees works and will assure bread is properly done.
Rabbi Rob’s Notes:
Since our lives depend on bread, G-d gave us a mitzvah to fulfill when we bake. To commemorate the gift of a small piece of dough to the Kohanim, called hafrashat challah, we still separate an olive sized portion of the dough as a reminder of what we are actually doing when we make bread. We are creating like G-d, and take a bit of what we have made, a bit of what we have breathed life into, and return it to G-d. This piece can be wrapped in aluminum foil and burned when nothing else is in the oven, or wrapped and discarded.
Blessing After Kneading (Remove a small piece of dough to bake separately).
Ba-rukh ata Adonai,
Elo-hei-nu me-lekh ha-olam
Asher ki-d’shanu b’mitz-votav
V’tzi-vanu, l’haf-rish
Hallah min ha-isa.
Blessed are you, Adonai our God,
Ruler of the Universe,
Who has sanctified us with mitzvot
And commanded us to separate out
A portion of dough (in your honor).
After the dough is set aside, say: This is Hallah!
Harei zu Hallah!
Poem by Tamar Frankiel, found in the book, A Blessing of Bread.
Challah, the offering of the dough,
the kneading of the bread,
Folding and turning,
The sticky lump of flour and water,
Comes to life in the hand,
Springs back,
Lumps becoming smooth,
Folding and turning,
Turning and folding,
Pressing,
Pushing,
Punching,
There is my love,
There is my anger,
There is my hurried day’s work,
There is my relief and my joy.
May blessings come to those who receive the challah,
Powerful are you, God, who has made us holy,
Bringing the bread to rise
Under our hand.
Here: a piece to the fire, to the offering,
To the Kohanim,
Our work, our life goes to you.
We give before we eat.
Rabbi Rob’s Reading List for Challah.
Abramowitz, Rabbi Jack. “You’ve Never Eaten Challah: The obligation to separate a portion of dough for a kohein.” Retrieved from https://www.ou.org/
Fohrman, Rabbi David. “Challah: What’s So Special About Making Dough?” Retrieved from https://www.alephbeta.org/
Glezer, Maggie. (2004). A Blessing of Bread. New York, NY: Artisan Books.
Heller, Rebbetzin Tziporah. (2005, January 22). “Challah: The Divine Dough.” Retrieved from https://www.aish.com/
Hersch, Gabrielle Adena. (2018, May). Challah and Its Performance of American Jewish Identity from the Mid-19th to Early 21st Century. Brandeis Institutional Repository. Retrieved from http://bir.brandeis.edu/
Kolatch, Alfred. (2003). The Jewish Book of Why. New York, NY: Penguin Books.
Melamed, Rabbi Eliezer. (2018, January 23). What’s So Special About Taking Challah? Israel National News. Retrieved from http://www.israelnationalnews.com
Ricanati, Beth. (2018). Braided: A Journey Of A Thousand Challahs. Berkeley, CA: She Writes Press.
Zamore, Mary. (2011). The Sacred Table: Creating a Jewish Food Ethic. New York, NY: CCAR Press.
Zion, Noam Sachs and Fields-Meyer, Shawn. (2004). A Day Apart. Jerusalem, Israel: Shalom Hartman Institute.
