Cinnamon Challah

Cinnamon Challah .. a great alternative to Cinnamon Buns. Perfect for toast or just slathered with butter and this bread makes a fantastic French Toast!

We love Challah, I make it every Friday. We love Cinnamon Buns so this is an easy win! Cinnamon Buns are usually Dairy made with lots of butter but this Cinnamon Challah is parve/non-dairy.

Challah & Cinnamon…this one was quite quick to make..I had decided last minute to make this & it was done in just about 2 hours…which is quick for yeast bread I think.  It was very good, hard not to eat it all up right from the oven. The house smelt great!

  I saw this recipe on Facebook. It is from yourjstory.com. I made a couple changes to the recipe, I used sugar instead of honey & canola oil instead of olive oil in the bread dough. I also used Quick Rise yeast.

Here is the link to the original recipe

http://www.yourjstory.com/jewlish/no-bowl-cinnamon-roll-challah/

Cinnamon Challah

Ingredients

Bread dough

3 1/2 cups flour

3 eggs total…2 for the dough & 1 for the braided challah

1 pkg of dry active yeast ( 2 1/4 tsp )

3 tbsp of sugar

1/3 cup canola oil

1 tsp salt

2/3 cup warm water

Cinnamon Filling

1/3 cup canola oil

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

pinch of salt

1 cup raisins- optional

Method

Line a baking sheet ( large enough for a loaf of bread) with parchment paper

1. Put the flour in a large bowl.
2. Add 2 eggs, yeast, honey, olive oil, salt & the warm water
3. Mix well with a wooden spoon or your hands, bringing all the ingredients together forming a dough
4. Knead for 7 minutes
5. Leave in the bowl, cover & let rise for 1 hour in a warm place
6. Mix the ingredients for the cinnamon filling together at this point so that when the bread dough is ready, you can put the filling on
7. Once the dough has risen, divide it into 3 equal pieces, and set aside
8. Taking one piece of bread dough & using a rolling pin, roll the piece of bread dough into a rectangle. ***Use a small amount of flour if needed on the rolling pin & rolling surface so the dough does not stick to the rolling pin but be careful not to use too much flour as this can make your dough stiff
9. Spread the rolled dough with 1/3 of the cinnamon mixture, leaving approximately 1 inch of dough on all sides *** this is so that the filling does not  ooze out too much when rolled up! If you like raisins sprinkle the raisins on the dough.
10. Once the cinnamon filling is on, starting with the longest side, roll up the bread dough into a log. Pinch the ends tightly together. Set aside
11. Do the same with the remaining 2 pieces of dough & the rest of the cinnamon filling
12. You can stretch the logs out a bit if they are too thick…they should be about 12 inches long
13. Take the 3 rolls & braid them, gathering the ends together tightly
14. Place your cinnamon challah dough on the parchment lined baking sheet.
15. Cover & let rise in a warm place for 30 minutes *** do not cover tightly.  Just cover it with a clean dish towel. if your dough is sticky, flour the cloth lightly before covering the bread dough to prevent it from sticking to the challah
16. While the dough is rising, pre-heat your oven to 375F
17. Whisk the remaining egg
18. Once the challah has risen for the 30 minutes, uncover & gently brush all over with the beaten egg
19. Bake for 30 minutes. ***my challah started getting too brown so as recommended in the original recipe, I covered the bread with some alumminium foil
20. Cool on the cookie sheet for awhile & then continue cooling on a wire rack

Enjoy!