Recipe: Greek Bread

This is a yeast bread that I've made for many years. I got the recipe from my sister, she got it from her first husband, and neither of us is sure where he got it. As I recall, braiding it was an idea of my own, the first time I made it. It's so good that way, increasing the area of the tender crust, that I've never done it any other way.

Put one package (2 1/4 teaspoons) regular yeast in a bowl. Pour over it one half cup of warm water. Let it dissolve.

Slice up half a stick of butter (2 ounces). Put it in a metal or pyrex bowl. Add two tablespoons of sugar and two teaspoons of salt. Scald two cups of whole milk and pour it over this mixture. Let it cool to lukewarm.

Combine the yeast mixture and the milk mixture. Add enough bread flour to make a batter, like pancake batter. Beat 100 strokes.

Let rise for 50 minutes.

Knead in enough bread flour to make a dough that is solid but tacky, not quite sticky.

Put in a greased bowl, and grease the top (this improves rising by preventing the dough from forming a crustlike dry spot on top). Cover with a damp, smooth kitchen towel (not terry, unless you are ready for some VERY interesting laundry), Set it in a warm place to rise for 40 minutes or until doubled.

Punch down and let rise again for 40 minutes or until almost doubled.

To make a braided loaf, separate the dough into thirds. Form each third into a long cylinder.

Lay them parallel on a piece of baking parchment and begin braiding in the center. (If you start at one end, you can't finish the opposite end neatly.)

Braid to the end and turn the bread around.

Now comes the only "trick" to this--if you braided the first half by laying one strand over the other, as we normally braid, you have to do the second half by laying it under. Or, as in this case, vice versa. Otherwise, you'd just unbraid the first half. This is one of those things that's easy to do and hard to explain. Here's the finished braid:

Tuck the ends under for a nice finish. Let the loaf rise for about 30 minutes.

Bake in a 375 oven for about 35 minutes…it depends. It’s done when it is browned and makes a hollow sound when you turn it over and thump it on the bottom. Or when the inside is about 195 degrees.

I did a slight variation on this particular loaf. I substituted 1 cup of sprouted wheat flour for an equal amount of the bread flour.