The Challah Memo
Dear Mr. Kimball,
Thanks to one of your never-ending e-mail solicitations, I was excited to discover that you’ve published a recipe for challah on the Cook’s Illustrated website this month. Upon reading it, though, I began to wonder whether you’re really based on Station Street in Brookline. Specifically:
Why settle for commercial mediocrity when you can bake this tender-crumbed, golden-hued loaf better at home?
With a simple two-step braid and glossy brown exterior, this eggy loaf looks as good as anything prepared by professional bakers.
Either you’re actually stuck in the midwest somewhere, or you’ve never gone any farther than ultra-nearby Stop & Shop — which sells a scary fluorescent-yellow loaf — in order to evaluate professionally baked challahs.
First and foremost, any aficionado knows that looks alone won’t get you far. Many a beautiful challah have been baked to a dark brown with perfectly scattered sesame seeds atop, only to reveal a hard, dry crust and bland interior with too fine a crumb. Perhaps the photo you provided doesn’t do your challah justice, but I doubt it would come close to any of the fine challahs sold at Cheryl Ann’s Bakery in Putterham Circle, Creative Pastries in Coolidge Corner, or Rosenfeld’s Bakery in Newton Centre — each with delicate crusts, dense interiors, and slightly sticky sides. (And make sure you get to Rosenfeld’s early Friday morning, so you can try their chocolate chip or onion challahs.)
And butter? As an avid reader of your magazine and owner of your cookbooks, I admire your scientific approach and commitment to perfection, but is it really challah if the recipe patently disregards the culture which birthed it? (For future reference, at least the option of vegetable oil or margarine to make a non-dairy loaf would be nice.)
At least you don’t call it challah bread, so thanks for that.
Best wishes,
The Kosher Blog
I’m not surprised at the introduction. We all know that every Cook’s Illustrated recipe article is founded on the assumption that nobody’s ever made the dish well before.
I can affirm that they are indeed based in Brookline.
It’s rather bizarre that Cook’s Illustrated would sugest butter. One would think that chefs that pride themselves on doing extensive research and testing of recipes would have discovered that the reason why challah is never made with butter is because it would mean that most Jews couldn’t eat it with the meal the bread was designed to accompany!
I think that’s just a brioche recipe with the braiding added. What a farce.
Fern: For better or worse, that’s how CI operates. Their goal is to make food that tastes best in their opinion, not to stay authentic. I’m sure this annoys lots of people from different cultures, and I’m sure they know that. They may not have thought through the implications of this one since, as you said, it actually makes the food inedible.
Lawrence, I wouldn’t say inedible, but rather unable to be eaten (with a meat meal at least).
HUGE difference.
But hey, it would go wonderfully with our ocassional milchig shabbos.
Actually… dairy breads raise their own unique kashrut issues, as we’ve beleagueredly discussed in previous threads. (If you’re unfamiliar, ask your rabbi.)
Actually… dairy breads raise their own unique kashrut issues
Yes, but you can get around them, say, by shaping your challah as a croissant or a giant letter “D”. In any case, there are certainly worse kashrut sins (such as a recipe I once saw for chicken matso ball soup that included butter in the matso balls).
Just to flesh out ELF’s comment, there is no halachik problem serving a dairy bread so long as the loaf is baked in a non-traditional shape, thus eliminating the risk that it may be confused for a pareve loaf.
I used to subscribe to CI until they became overly pompous about their views of others cooking and how nothing already out there was close to the perfection they could attain. It really ticked me off when they got the definition of kosher wrong. I do miss the reviews of books and products though, especially the high rankings of Empire.
As another side note, back in the late ’90s I sent them a letter telling them they were cowards and if they really wanted a challenge , do a real kosher issue with all that entails.
oh - and the butter in chalah recipe ? Don’t remember the magazine, but for Passover dinner they had a Tabbouleh recipe which called for bulgur.
I worked for Cooks many years ago, in Ct. Mr. Kimball was not around during the day, although he did come in at night, apparently, as food needed for the next day’s recipe testing would sometimes disappear. I don’t buy the “new” Cook’s or the books, as lots of it seems to be stream- of-consciousness about their experiments in the kitchen; things someone with minimal food training or some curiosity would have known about.. At the time Mr Kimball struck me as being more a social butterfly than a publisher of a food (or any) magazine.
Dairy Challah (with the appropriate “sign” in it to maintain kashrus) — how about that for Shavuos?
According to the Shulchan Aruch, there is no such thing as dairy bread. Our local grocery store bakery went from being totally parve to dairy. The Rav HaMakshir has instructed those of us that follow kashrus not to eat any of the bread coming out of the bakery. Pastries and cookies are ok but no bread.
Aaron:
What you write is NOT what the Shulchan Aruch states.
Bread which is not pareve (i.e. dairy or meat) must have a “sign” baked into the bread. The sign can be a change in the shape, or the bread can be baked in a small quantity sufficient only for one meal. That is the law acc. to the Shulchan Aruch as it must be followed at home.
A bakery is more complex, because it is not clear that the “sign” the baker will put into the bread will be recognized or understood by anyone of his customers. Hence some hechsherim generally do not permit non-pareve bread. (Although some hold that the “D” on the wrapper suffices; others disagree.)
At home, it is quite easy for the baker to shape a dairy (or meat) loaf into an unusual shape and that is the sign.
For those who want to look it up, the Shulkhan Aruch is Yoreah Deah 97:1.
R. Howard Jachter has an excellent article on this issue here:
http://www.koltorah.org/ravj/Dairy%20Bread.htm
Julia Child published a challah recipe which used butter.
And a few years ago, Jacques Pepin did a Chanukkah-themed cooking show in which he roasted a leg of lamb as the entree and prepared a luscious cheesecake for dessert.
If you’re a master chef, no one tells you what to do, even G-d.
My opinion of the CI recipe: calls for too many eggs, oil makes a challah with a waaaay better texture and the yeast should be proofed first. Other than that, I approve of… their use of flour?
As someone who spent 18 years “stuck in the midwest somewhere,” I just want you to know that we DO have excellent bakery challot. Milwaukee is home to the original Breadsmith, which is 100% kosher (pareve). And I tell you, Cheryl Ann’s just can’t compete.
http://www.breadsmith.com/locations/milwaukee.html
Hi, Michelle– Their breads look delicious… but are you sure they’re still kosher (”pepperoni bread”) and pareve (”potato cheddar chive”)?
Not all of the locations are kosher. According to the website, it’s only the ones in Skokie, Indianapolis, South Bend, Edina, Minnetonka, St. Paul and Cincinnati. The one in Milwaukee was also kosher last time I was there, although the website seems to indicate that this is no longer the case…I’ll ask my mother.
Notice how it says on the breads page “Please note that kosher descriptions may differ from those listed below?” Information on the breads sold in the kosher stores is here:
http://www.breadsmith.com/kosherinfo.html
The pepperoni bread and such are absent. :-)