Host kitchen for the BBB this month was Tanna at My Kitchen in Half Cups, and she chose a wonderful sweet loaf to make. Can I just say once again how much I love working with a dough as silky soft and supple as this one was? And it bakes off so tender too! The crumb is absolutely pillowy soft. (Even when you leave it in a few minutes too long.) I used instant yeast instead of the osmotolerant and it was still very happy dough. The range for the brown sugar was 30 - 100 grams and I used a mix of brown and granulated coconut sugars. The granulated form of coconut sugar has a caramely flavor to it that I thought would be nice in a sweet bread. And since I didn't have any spuds on hand for potato water, I added a teaspoon of potato starch to give an approximate effect. It seemed to work; like I said, the dough was heavenly to work with. Oh, my two loaves were done in about 35-40 minutes. Much faster than specified, but my oven tends to run hot even when I turn it down. Next time I'll take them out earlier and probably bake in a cake pan. I'd also skip the egg wash and brush with melted butter after baking. This bread made fabulous french toast; my daughter went bonkers over it and had it for both breakfast and lunch the next day. And what regular toast it makes too. Mmmm, mmm! Give it a try, I'm sure you won't be disappointed! And from what I've seen of the other posts, this one has been baked repeatedly this month. ☺
Sweet Portuguese Bread
(Massa Sovada)
Over night sponge:
72 grams bread flour
2 ¼ teaspoons osmotolerant yeast (Instant Yeast worked just as well too)
114 milliliters potato water, or whey or water (potato water or whey really make it extra tender & soft)
Mix together the sponge ingredients the night before baking the bread. Leave sitting at room temperature for 8 to 12 hours (overnight).
Dough:
6 tablespoons butter, room temp.
30 to 100 grams brown sugarlemon zest
1 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs, room temp.
120 milliliters milk, room temp.
460 grams bread flour (you can use part whole wheat if you like)
2 tablespoons flax seeds, ground
Beat sugar and butter until creamy. Add zest and salt and beat. Beat in each egg separately and completely; mix will appear curdled. Stir in milk and sponge. Stir in 2 ½ cups flour and beat vigorously (in a stand mixer it would clear the sides of the bowl, by hand lifting the spoon up should stretch the dough about a foot.) Add remaining flour to make stiff dough. Knead 5 minutes or more to incorporate all the flour. Dough should be smooth, soft and very supple with a slight stickiness. Looks a little like very thick cake batter or a brioche dough.
Shape into ball, oil bowl and dough ball. Cover and allow to rise about 2 hours, should almost or triple in size. Divide into loaves, shaped into balls. Allow to rest 20 to 30 minutes before final shaping with rolling pin.
Press in a cross and then an X with a narrow rolling pin. For best demarcation of indents be careful to dust dough ball well with flour. (I used a wok chopstick to indent my dough.)
I think this would make a fabulous braid too! May try that next...