Following a Cultural Bread-Making Tradition

Baking fresh challah is one of the most sacred of Jewish traditions.

It is also an exercise in patience, of which I happen to have very little.

But what a payoff — a marvelously light yet hearty loaf, golden, with that distinctive braid and warm aroma. There’s soft, flaky bread the first day, killer French toast the next, and perhaps stuffing or croutons the next. And there’s the satisfaction that it involved no bread machine or trip to the bakery.

The very possibility of this was enough to nudge me through the many steps of a challah-making demonstration at the Adath Shalom synagogue in Morris Plains. Its goal was to demystify the baking process and highlight the bread’s rich cultural traditions.

“It is considered a source of tremendous blessing,” said Devorah Klar, a Hebrew school principal who helped lead the workshop. “If all women knew the kind of blessing that we derive by doing this ourselves, bakeries would go out of business.”

It is customary for Jews to eat challah to begin dinners on the Sabbath and holidays, Klar explained. Often, it has seven ingredients, for each day of the week. Each dinner has two loaves, to represent an extra piece of manna that had to be collected on Fridays.

Though plain challah remains popular, there are lots of variations.

Zadie’s Kosher Bakery in Fair Lawn sells garlic, onion and whole-wheat varieties. Butterflake Bakery in Teaneck makes a German water challah, with no oil or eggs.

During the first month of the Jewish new year, it is common to add raisins to symbolize a sweet New Year. Klar sometimes even adds chocolate chips. Klar’s co-instructor, Sonia Wolff, who has long baked challah for her family of 13 children, likes to sprinkle a loaf with onions and salt.

Other women at the demonstration talked about mixing pesto into the dough, rolling it in cinnamon and sugar or making a whole-wheat loaf with honey. Shapes, too, vary — while braids are traditional, other shapes range from round crowns (for Rosh Hashanah) and pull-apart breads (which eliminate the need for a knife at the table) to simple rolls to merely stuffing the dough into a basic loaf pan.

Wolff starts her dough by putting flour into a bowl, making a well and pouring in water, in which she dissolves active dry yeast and a little sugar. She pours the rest of the sugar around the perimeter of the bowl, and once the yeast is activated, adds oil and eggs.

She likes to knead the dough with one hand, while keeping one hand on the bowl. The dough takes about two hours to rise.

If the dough is a certain size — generally, Wolff said, if it uses at least 10 cups of flour — it is custom once it has risen to separate a small piece of dough from the loaf in commemoration of a gift the Jewish people once gave to the priestly tribe. The piece is then wrapped in foil and burned in the oven (separately from the bread).

The lovely braiding patterns that are typical of challah are not as difficult as they look, Wolff taught us: a round crisscross, three braids, four braids. I went for the six braids, wondering if I was setting myself up for a mess.

The trick was to make the strands as even as possible, while not overworking the dough. Though frustrating, it was therapeutic to roll and pull the dough into strands (while trying not to coat myself in flour).

Recipes generally call for letting the dough rise a second time, but Wolff says she merely places her loaves in the oven while it preheats. Brushing with egg gives the challahs their characteristic shine. We sprinkled ours with sesame seeds.

Challah plays an important role in the Sabbath dinner, traditionally kicking it off.

Klar said it is custom to dip the pieces in salt. Debby Lissaur, a fellow workshop participant from Randolph, said she and her husband spent the first year of their marriage dipping their challah in honey, to symbolize a sweet marriage.

As for my own homemade challahs, alas, one was too small and it burned. But the other was a shiny if awkwardly shaped golden braid crammed with fluffy layers and an aroma so inviting that it did not make it home intact.

E-mail: ung@northjersey.com

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Tips for baking challah

First, have patience, says Butterflake Bakery co-owner Richard Heisler, who has baked challah for 30 years and says, “I’ve made every mistake you can make.”

The most common complaint he hears from home bakers is that their challah did not rise enough. Heisler says it’s important not to rush the dough. Butterflake expedites the second rising by using a steam box, but home bakers can cover their bread and let it sit in a warm, steamy area, perhaps “an environment where you’ve boiled water.”

You can freeze leftover challah dough, to defrost and bake later, as well as baked challah.

It is tradition never to throw out leftover challah. Some ideas for leftovers: French toast, kugel, bread pudding, bread crumbs, stuffing, sandwich bread.

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Classic challah

For the bread:

2 ounces fresh yeast or 4 packages dry yeast
3½ cups warm water
¾ cup sugar
1½ tablespoons salt
13 to 14 cups of flour
6 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup oil
For the glaze:

1 egg, beaten
Poppy or sesame seeds
Dissolve yeast in warm water in a large bowl. When dissolved, add sugar, salt and half of the flour. Mix well.

Add eggs and oil, then slowly stir in most of the remaining flour — dough will become thick. (Until the kneading stage, dough can be mixed in an electric mixer.)

When dough begins to pull away from sides of bowl, turn onto floured board and knead for about 10 minutes. Add only enough flour to make dough manageable. Knead until dough is smooth and elastic and springs back when pressed lightly with fingertip.

Place dough in a large oiled bowl. Turn it so the top is oiled as well. Cover with a damp towel and let rise in a warm place for two hours, punching down in four or five places every 20 minutes.

Separate a small challah piece with a blessing, to be burnt. Divide the dough into four to six parts and shape into loaves; place in well-greased bread pans or on greased baking sheet. Let rise until double in bulk.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Brush tops of loaves with beaten egg and sprinkle with poppy or sesame seeds. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes or until browned. Remove from pans and cool on racks.

Yield: 4 to 6 loaves.

From: The complete Challah Baking Guide, Lubavitch Center of Essex County.