Has to be one of my favourite breakfast breads. Don’t really do sweet stuff but this has a gentle sweetness from a small amount of honey (12%) and the raisins. Look carefully. Not a single raisin has been stolen by the raisin thief – you have to get up early for that.
Remembering and negotiating the shaping of a single-strand braid is stressful for the baker; allowing a lot of time to rest is crucial when rolling out to avoid stressing the dough. The amount of wholemeal (50%) and raisins (50%) in the dough makes it easy to over-stretch and tear. I now use the final hour of fermentation to gradually roll out to length. Another effective technique is forgetting the time – I’m getting quite good at this in my old age. This technique also works well in the final proof – I think it had an extra hour last night while I was watching the news. But the dough benefits from the extra recovery time – it’s been pretty mauled about in the shaping process.
The perfect breakfast (one of them anyway).
Formula and other challah matters here https://thepartisanbaker.com/challah/
The PArtisan Baker 