This egg bread recipe was given to me by two elderly women in Hawaii, and it is superior to all other egg bread. It’s wonderful when used for French toast and bread pudding, and when you try chopping it into chunks for fondue, wow!
| Prep Time: | 25 mins |
| Cook Time: | 40 mins |
| Additional Time: | 2 hrs 20 mins |
| Total Time: | 3 hrs 25 mins |
| Servings: | 18 |
| Yield: | 1 braided loaf |
Ingredients
- 2 (.25 ounce) packages active dry yeast
- ⅔ cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
- 6 large egg yolks
- 4 large eggs, at room temperature, divided
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- ¼ cup white sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 4 ½ cups all-purpose flour, divided
- 1 pinch salt
Instructions
- Dissolve yeast in warm water in a large bowl. Let stand until yeast softens and begins to form a creamy foam, about 5 minutes.
- Stir in egg yolks, 3 whole eggs, oil, sugar, and salt. Mix in 3 1/2 cups of flour to make a sticky dough.
- Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead with remaining 1 cup flour until smooth and elastic, about 7 minutes. Transfer dough to a well-oiled bowl and turn until entire surface is coated with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 1/2 hours.
- Punch down the dough and divide into thirds. Roll each piece into a 12-inch long rope. Braid the three strands together and seal the ends. Transfer the bread to a greased cookie sheet.
- Whisk remaining egg with a pinch of salt; brush on top and sides of bread. Set eggwash aside. Let bread rise until doubled in volume, about 45 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Brush bread again with eggwash.
- Bake in the preheated oven until golden, about 40 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 214 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 27 g |
| Cholesterol | 110 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 6 g |
| Saturated Fat | 2 g |
| Sodium | 148 mg |
| Sugars | 3 g |
| Fat | 9 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Amazing, light and fluffy. I only baked it for 25 minutes @375. My house smells so good!
This made my house smell amazing, it has great flavor and is so full of protein. But – it is HUGE. I used a 9×13 pan and it just kept growing. Lol
I doubled the recipe, using instant yeast, so I was able to put everything into mixing bowl together at same time and the best part? Only one rise for 20 minutes+ the time it took oven to reach baking temp. I used one baking sheet for each loaf, rotating pans during baking, and using foil for tenting tops when browned. The recipe is not written for today’s efficient ovens. Do check loaf at 20-25 minutes. It is a plain bread that relies on its toppings or soak like french toast to make it shine. If I make this again, I will use half chicken broth/water for the water. Why? My heirloom family recipe for similar bread does same. This resolves the salt issue. The texture is like an airy sponge. It’s beautiful! If you ended up with a dry, crumbly or pasty bagel texture…it’s not the recipe’s fault. The loaf size is the same as what I remember of childhood, but you could get 2 braided loaves of more standard size from this recipe. I choose to make the gigantic single loaf because it looks glorious. You just need 2 gallon sized Ziploc to package it. I would only give it top stars if the cook time and flavoring (adding broth) were edited.
This recipe came from someone in Hawaii of all places, interesting. I say this because it’s the closest egg bread to the one I remember from childhood that was bought from a popular Jewish bakery. Although the crust is similar, theirs was more billowy, like cotton and had a more buttery taste. Perhaps the difference would be to add a bit more fat but still as is, I would say this recipe is classic. As shown in the photo it produced 3 small loafs (2 in different sized loaf pans.) I increased the salt by ½ t, used extra-large eggs (one had a double yolk) and otherwise used olive oil instead of vegetable. Baked time was 25 mins (which started as the oven heated to temp. having interrupted after 10 mins to re-egg wash the tops and sprinkle the 1 with seeds.) Next time I will swap out the water for milk as well the oil for butter and make 2 fuller loaves and a couple of buns instead. That said, this recipe can easily be cut in half.
Nice bread. However, this was enough for two loaves, not one. So I split it and made two loaves and cooked only 20 minutes, and it turned out perfect.
This is my absolutely FAVORITE bread now! It is like a dream. Okay, it DOES make a huge loaf, but it is GLORIOUSLY huge and we love it, and, you know, Challah is a Festival Bread, so celebrate! We make it into a four-strand braid so that the “knobs” are smaller. It is fabulous out of the oven: you tear off a knob and butter it, it has a soft-crunch crust, and the lightest interior. But the BEST part, I think, is that it keeps for WEEKS in the fridge, and you just tear off knobs for dinner, wrap them loosely in tinfoil, warm them 10 or 15 minutes in a 400 oven until the edges crisp up again, serve them with real butter, and they are a melt-in-your-mouth DREAM. THANK YOU FOR THIS AWESOME RECIPE!!!! (SMOOCH SMOOCH!!!! 🙂 And to think we first tried it as a way to use up extra eggs…. p.s. We use 2 cups of King Arthur Whole Wheat Flour and the rest Pillsbury All-Purpose, a great combination. DONE AFTER 30 MINUTES IN OVEN.
I made this twice. First time was awful, threw it out. 2nd time not much better. Was too crumbly and had no taste. With the price of eggs these days, I won’t try it again.
This was soooo easy to make! Yes, there’s a decent rise time, but no biggie – just plan ahead. But this made a MASSIVE and BEAUTIFUL loaf! I mean LOOK at this thing! ????
It rose much faster than expected
My daughters have made this recipe several times, it has become a family favorite. We enjoy substituting in three whole duck eggs for the three whole chicken eggs to give it a richer flavor. It makes a great gift and we are always thrilled to share this recipe from allrecipes with our friends.
OK, first -half this recipe. Considering other peoples comments on the flavor, I added a couple tablespoons of honey and it did not help. I did like the texture of the bread. Very soft and fluffy on the inside with a decent crust. However, it tasted way too eggy. The most I can say is I’m going to cut it up dry it out and make a French toast bake with it. If you were still keen on making this, take note the cooking time should be about half of what is stated. I think I cooked mine slightly over 20 minutes and even then it was a little too much.
I checked the oven 10 minutes before it came out and it looked and smelled so delicious I was so excited to try it. -olivia wilson -12
They came out great, definitely should make two loafs. I braided both, put one out freestyle & put one in a loaf pan. Also, cooked for 25min and inside temperature was 205. Crust was hard due to the 2-3 egg washes, can put aluminum foil (spray first so it doesn’t stick!) over it for a bit to keep from getting too hard. I did the 6 eggs that someone suggested and it was fine, but not as sweet as challah/egg bread usually is. Didn’t like it as much. I’m guessing it was the eggs since that’s the only item I changed. Will try again using recipe as written.
I have made this recipe 3 times. I love it! I give this recipe all the stars you can give it. I make an omelet for myself every morning with egg whites, and I am always looking for something good to make with the yolks, because my husband can eat them. I have put sesame seeds, poppy seeds, and a wash on this. I think I might make something with pecans and a tiny bit of glaze. This is a great all purpose recipe and easy to make.
This is an awesome egg bread/challah recipe. I used quick-rise yeast instead of active, used 6 whole eggs instead of 6 yolk+3whole, used brown sugar instead of white, substituted 1 cup of all purpose with coarse wheat flour, and added 1 tsp of honey. I did half of it and it was still a nice big loaf.
Wow! One of the most amazing bread recipes EVER. Followed the recipe exactly an it turned out perfectly! Subtracted about 15 minutes from the cook time. So fluffy.
I tried it and overall liked it very much. It was very easy to put together.I will make it again but with a few adjustments. A few comments that rang a bell with me: not much flavour , very huge loaf, and not sweet enough. So I am thinking that more SALT is needed – maybe 1.5 or 2 teaspoons to liven up the flavour. And maybe only one packet of dry yeast instead of two so it doesn’t get so huge. And as was suggested – increase the sugar to ½ C to sweeten it up just a bit. And I used ¼ C oil and ¼ C melted butter –gotta have that buttery flavour. Another comment — try 6 whole eggs instead of the 6 yolks and 3 whole eggs — I might try that one sometime. Adding a pinch of salt to the egg wash was a very nice touch. I love an eggy bread. Nothing quite like it. Thank you for the recipe.
It baked beautifully. rich color and very eggy!! I will make it again.
Easy, soft n delicioys. I just dont know how to brad perfectly but it wash great to make it!
I used only 4 cups of flour and the dough turned out perfect. I followed the recipe instructions exactly. My suggestion would be to cover the loaf for the first 20 minutes of baking as this browned way too quickly and when finished it had a hard thick crust. It was not the most flavorful loaf of bread and all that the egg really did was make it a little heavier than a normal baked bread recipe. I will try it again to see how it works on a lower heat…..maybe 325.
I took some reviewers suggestions and used 7 eggs ( because 2 of them were very small) instead of using eggs and yolks. I also added 1/4 cup raw honey in addition to the white sugar. I let it rise 3 times instead of twice. It made a HUGE loaf. I let it bake for 20 mins and sit in the oven a minute or two. I can see this being a staple in our kitchen!!