Honey Whole Wheat Challah

In the spirit of experimentation I tried a new challah recipe this week. Last time I baked challah I was informed that I could just use the mixer to knead the dough instead of doing it with my hands. Thinking that this would make my life so much easier, I began the recipe with high hopes.

After kneading the dough for awhile with the machine, the dough was still very sticky and appeared unaffected by the efforts. I assumed the dough would clump up around the dough hook and basically pull away from the edge of the bowl. It didn't do this and so I kept adding flour in the hopes that it would. After awhile, about 15 minutes or so and at least a few extra cups of flour, I decided the dough (and I) had had enough. I managed to get it out of the bowl and into a clean and oiled bowl for rising. Turns out it was OK and the kneading seemingly worked but in the process I had become a bit frustrated. I used about a kilo of flour in total. What was I doing wrong?

I discussed this with my husband, the food scientist. He explained that measuring flour in cups is highly inaccurate (since you could fill up a cup of flour, press it down firmly and then add a lot more) and a better, more accurate, way to measure out flour is by weight (in grams). In the future I'll look for a recipe that measures out the flour in grams, which works out well for me since I love using our food scale. (It appeals to my detail oriented and exacting nature.)

Here is the recipe I used. A couple modifications; I used instant yeast so I didn't have to bother letting it stand for 10 minutes. I also used 1/2 cup of honey (date honey) instead of 1/3 cup - to emphasize the sweetness a bit more. Lastly, I tried a four strand braid - watch this video tutorial for instructions.

Lesson learned: measure your flour by weight. Questions: How easy is it to come up with your own bread/challah recipe? Is this one of those things that takes a lot of trial and error that I won't have the patience for? Maybe I should let others pave the way and just benefit from their hard work. Or I can let the food scientist in the house figure it out for me....