Poolish Ingredients

• Small pinch of Instant Yeast

• 255 ml Water

• 255 g All Purpose Flour

Challah Method

1. Mix the poolish with a spoon or Danish whisk until fully incorporated. Cover and allow to rise for 10-12 hours overnight. 

2. In a separate bowl, dissolve the yeast in water and set aside. Weigh the honey and oil into a stand mixer bowl, then add eggs and yolks. Immediately whisk to combine (if the yolks contact the honey too long they will harden). Add flour, salt, levain, poolish, and dissolved yeast to the bowl. 

3.  Mix the ingredients by hand with the mixer dough hook until they begin to come together. Attach the hook and bowl to the mixer, and mix on second speed until the dough starts to become uniform. 

4. Turn the mixer up to medium speed and allow the dough to mix until it pulls cleanly away from the sides and becomes very smooth. Depending on your mixer, this will take anywhere from 8-12 minutes. Keep in mind that intensive mixing on a homestand mixer is difficult on the machine. Listen for sounds of stress and turn down if needed. There is a risk of overheating your machine if you are not careful! It is normal for the machine to become hot. Most KitchenAid machines recommend mixing dough on low speed, but this will not give you the development you need for this enriched dough. The higher the speed, the quicker the dough will come together. If the hook is not able to turn, you must turn the speed down. NOTE: The friction from the mixer will heat up the dough. Stop mixing if the dough temperature is above 28C to avoid overheating the dough.

5. Turn the dough out onto a very lightly floured surface and divide into two. Take each half and divide again into 3, 4, 5 or 6 pieces depending on the braid you would like to do. If you are making a 6-strand braid, you will have 12 pieces in total. If you’d like to divide the pieces by weight, each loaf will be 850g.

6. Divide the weight of each loaf by the number of pieces you need for your braid. Press the air completely out of each piece of dough. Place the smoothest side down and pull four corners one by one into the centre of the dough (it’s fine if your piece isn’t a neat square; do your best). Flip the dough over so the smooth side is now up, and round it lightly by rolling it under your palm using your thumb and fingers to gently tuck the dough under itself as you roll your hand in a circle creating tension. Be sure that the smooth side stays on top! Cover the dough with a tea towel, and allow the dough to rest for 20 minutes.

7. Take each ball of dough, place smooth side (top) down on the table. Fold the top half into the middle and press down. Fold the bottom half into the middle and press down. Now fold the top of the dough all the way to the bottom and press together to form a seam. You should end up with a slightly tapered cylinder. Repeat for all pieces. Lightly flour the table and gently roll each cylinder of dough into a 12-15” strand. Lightly flour each strand of dough before braiding to keep a good definition in the final braid.

8. BRAID: This part is better described in a video. Check out Mark’s Challah braid tutorials on Instagram or youtube.

9. Allow the braids to rise: Place the braided loaves onto a parchment-lined baking sheet being careful to leave enough space between them for the loaves to more than double in size. Cover with a lightly dampened cloth and allow to rise for 1.5-2 hours. They will be ready to bake when they have doubled in size and a floured finger leaves an indent that doesn’t spring back.

10. Brush the loaf with whisked whole egg being sure to cover the whole surface. Bake the challahBake at 425 F until the center reaches 190 F and the loaf is nicely browned. 

11. Cool on a wire rack (or just dig into it!).