Ingredient

Brioche

Brioche is an enriched bread — a great deal of butter and egg worked into a yeasted dough. That enrichment is what makes it rich and tender, and it is also what makes the dough slow to rise, sticky to handle and prone to going greasy. Nearly every technique in a brioche recipe is a response to the butter.

Why fat fights the dough

Fat coats things. In a bread dough it coats the flour proteins, physically getting between them and slowing the formation of the gluten network that gives bread its structure. It also weighs the dough down, so the gas the yeast produces has more work to do to lift it.

On top of that, sugar slows the yeast by drawing water away from it, and brioche has a fair amount of sugar as well as butter.

The result is a dough that rises slowly, needs long kneading, and is very soft. Two techniques deal with this and both are standard.

Build the gluten first, then add the butter. Mix the flour, yeast, sugar, salt, eggs and liquid and knead until the dough is smooth and elastic before any butter goes near it. Then add softened butter a little at a time, letting each addition disappear before the next. The network is already built and the fat enriches it rather than preventing it.

Keep everything cold and chill the dough. Warm brioche dough is a slack, greasy, unworkable mess. A long cold rise in the fridge — often overnight — firms the butter, makes the dough handleable, and develops far more flavour than a warm rise.

The method

The overnight chill is the step that turns brioche from difficult into straightforward.

1. Mix flour, yeast, sugar, salt, eggs and a little milk. Salt and yeast should not go in touching each other.
2. Knead until smooth and elastic — a good ten minutes in a mixer, longer by hand. It should pass a windowpane test before butter goes in.
3. Add softened but still cool butter in small pieces, a few at a time, kneading until each lot is fully incorporated. The dough will look broken and wrong at first and will come back together. Be patient.
4. Keep going until the dough is glossy, smooth and pulls away from the sides of the bowl. It will still be very soft.
5. First rise at room temperature until noticeably risen, then knock it back.
6. Chill it, covered, for at least four hours and ideally overnight. This is not optional in any practical sense — cold dough is what you can shape.
7. Shape it cold, working quickly. Loaf, plait, buns, or the classic brioche à tête with its topknot.
8. Prove until puffy and light — slower than an ordinary dough because of the fat and sugar, and it should not be rushed in a warm place, which melts the butter.
9. Egg-wash gently and bake in a moderate oven. It browns fast because of the sugar and egg, so cover it with foil if it colours before it is cooked through.

The variations

Brioche à tête

The classic fluted mould with a small topknot. The shape most associated with it.

Brioche Nanterre

Balls of dough baked side by side in a loaf tin, which pull apart. The most practical domestic shape.

Rich, medium and poor brioche

French bakeries distinguish by butter content relative to flour — from roughly equal weights down to much less. Richer is more tender, harder to handle and shorter-keeping.

Related enriched breads

Challah (oil and egg, no dairy), panettone (very long fermentation, fruit), Japanese milk bread (tangzhong or yudane, very soft), babka and kouign-amann.

Tangzhong

A cooked flour-and-water paste added to the dough, which lets it hold more water and stay soft for longer. Not traditional in brioche and increasingly used.

What to do with stale brioche

The best bread and butter pudding, French toast and burger buns there is. Its richness is an asset when stale.

What goes wrong

• Greasy dough that will not come together. Butter added too early, before the gluten was built, or the dough was too warm.
• Butter leaking out during baking. Dough over-proved, or proved somewhere too warm.
• Dense and heavy. Under-proved, or the yeast was struggling against the sugar and fat. Give it longer than an ordinary dough.
• Dough impossible to shape. Not chilled. Cold dough is the whole answer.
• Over-browned outside, raw inside. Egg and sugar brown fast. Cover with foil once it has colour and keep baking.
• Dry. Overbaked. Enriched doughs bake faster than lean ones.

Common questions