Who can teach me how to make brioche????

[Branster]

I imagine it involves serious baking (yeast, flour, eggs etc). When I tried in the past it never worked. I really want to make some home-made brioche which would actually turn out to be soft and fluffy. Can anyone help with a tried and tested recipe? I also absolutely love the kind they sell in Sainsbury , a loaf in a small tin with something called Creme Patissiere (don't know how to spell that). Anyone else like it? I can honestlyy eat one of those on my one in a very, very short time, it's soooo good!

Here's my recipe for brioche:
2 tablespoons warm water
1 tablespoon dried yeast
1 tablespoon caster sugar
10oz strong plain flour
1 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
3 oz butter
For the glaze: 1 eggyolk mixed with 2 tablespoons milk

Lightly warm a mixing bowl

Put the warm water and sugar into a jug, sprinkle with the yeast and sugar and stir. Cover and leave until frothy (about 10 minutes)

Sift the flour into the warm bowl, add the salt. Make a well in the flour and add the eggs and melted butter. With a wooden spoon work into the flour. Add the yeast mxture and beat until well combined.

Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 10 minutes until the dough is shiny, smooth and elastic.

Place in a clean, oiled bowl, cover with a tea towel and leave in a warm place until double in size (2 hours)

Turn the dough onto a floured surface, knead again for 2 minutes. Place in an oiled loaf tin or brioche mould. Brush lightly with the glaze, make 4 - 5 deep diagonal cuts in the top.

Cover and leave to rise until doubled in size (another 2 hours).

Bake in the centre of a preheated oven for 30 mins until well risen (gas mark 7/220C/425F). Cool on a wire rack before turning out.

It's a hassle but tastes lovely.

The secret is not to rush the proving, and to make sure that the water for the yeast is only warmish, not over-hot otherwise you kill the yeast.

Wow WigWamBam you sound like a real pro! Thank you so much. Will try it tonight and let you know the result (that's if I have any dried yeast in the cupboard). One quick question: does the glazing make the top surface hard like a crust? The ones I buy from the supermarket are very soft all over (one of the things I like about them), i wonder what they use.
Thank you so, so much for your message

I don't know about a pro, but I did a lot of baking before I had dd! The glaze just makes the top shiny and if you don't overcook them they should stay soft.

Fingers crossed!

Can I hire you on a weekly basis to do lots of baking for us?!

Thank you. I'll do my best and we shall see what comes out of the oven!

The other thing not to rush is the kneading - take plenty of time and be really brutal with it! It's very therapeutic

[Thread Hijack, apologies in advance}

WigWamBam, have you ever made a panettone? I have just put the mix in my breadmaker for the first time; that will do the first bit and then I need to do the rest. dh is convinced only bought panettone is OK, have you ever heard of home made?

No, never made panettone, sorry. I can't actually think that I've ever seen a recipe for it either! But I can't see why home-made panettone should be any worse than bought - these things haven't always only been made by machine have they!

Hope it goes OK

Clayhead , I used to have a recipe for Panetone which I got off the internet before last Christmas. Will have a look for it tonight and let you know if I still have it and I can write it down on here. It is in fact very simmilar to brioche isn't it? Of course mine didn't cook properly, I am just so useless at this baking stuff, but the recipe looked ok.
I love pnatonne too. And even the boxes are so sweet. We have a very nice garden centre near here where they sell all sorts of gourmet and unusual food stuffs and have quite a variety of these Italian breads around christmas time.
i'll stop here. will post on later.

Clayhead, I looked in my recipes folder and I haven't got the earlier mentioned panettone recipe. I must have thrown it away on the basis that it didn't work. However, i did a google search and found this recipe:

Recipe for Panettone

Ingredients

1/2 cup raisins
1/4 cup mixed peel
1/2 cup sultanas
1/3 cup marsala
8 teaspoons dry yeast
1 teaspoon fine sugar
1/4 cup warm milk
5 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup fine sugar, extra
3 eggs lightly beaten
3 egg yolks
2 teaspoons grated orange rind
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
100g (4oz) butter, softened
1 cup warm milk, extra
1 egg, extra

Method
Grease 2 deep 20cm (8 inch) round cake pans. Using string, tie a collar of greased foil around the outsides of prepared pans, bringing foil about 6cm above rims.
Combine fruit with marsala in small bowl; cover, stand 30 minutes.
Combine yeast, sugar and milk in small bowl. Whisk until yeast is dissolved. Cover, stand in warm place about 10 minutes or until mixture is frothy.
Sift flour, salt and extra sugar into large bowl, make a well in the centre, add eggs and egg yolks, then rind, essence, butter, extra milk, yeast mixture and undrained fruit mixture.
Beat dough vigorously with a wooden spoon about 5 minutes. This beating is important. The dough will be soft like a cake batter, and will become elastic and leave the side of the bowl.
Cover bowl with greased plastic wrap, stand in warm place about 30 minutes or until doubled in size.
Remove plastic wrap. Turn dough onto floured surface, knead until smooth.
Cut dough in half, knead each half on a well floured surface for about 5 minutes or until dough loses it´s stickiness.
Press dough into prepared pans.
Cover, stand in warm place, about 30 minutes or until doubled in size.
Brush panettone with extra egg.
Bake in moderately hot oven 15 minutes, reduce heat to moderate, bake about another 30 minutes.
This is fresh and light and is an Italian speciality.

Makes 2

Looks like hard work but it should taste wonderful.

I haven't got any yeast left in the cupboard so will try the brioche tommorow.

and another one:

Ingredients
1 cup flour, plus 2 t
1/8 tsp salt
1 package yeast, dry fast-rising
2 tbsp ; water, lukewarm
3 tbsp sugar, divided
2 eggs
8 tsp margarine
1/2 tsp orange peel, grated
1/2 tsp brandy extract
3 oz mixed dried fruit, coarsely chopped

Directions

Sift together flour and salt onto sheet of wax paper; set aside. In
small bowl sprinkle yeast over water; add 1 teaspoon sugar and stir
to dissolve. Let stand until foamy, about 5 minutes. In mixing bowl,
using electric mixer at medium speed, beat eggs with remaining sugar
until frothy; add margarine and beat until well combined. Continue to
beat while adding orange peel and brandy extract. Add yeast mixture,
then gradually beat in sifted flour; beat at high speed for 5
minutes. Add dried fruit, beating until thoroughly combined. Cover
bowl with clean damp towel or plastic wrap and let stand in warm
draft-free area until dough is doubled in volume, about 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400. Spray 3-cup fluted mold with nonstick cooking
spray. Punch dough down, then turn into prepared mold; bake in middle
of center oven rack for 10 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 325
and bake until top is browned and cake begins to pull away from mold,
about 30 minutes longer (cover with foil if Panettone is browning too
quickly). Unmold onto wire rack and let cool.