It's such a beautiful spring! The season has been especially kind to the lilacs, which are bursting out everywhere. Last week, I made lilac sugar. While I watched the bouquet of lilac blossoms on my table begin to wilt, I decided to use them to make a lilac Challah bread.
I used the lilac sugar in the recipe, but I also stripped off the petals of one of my blossoms and added it to the dough in the mixing stage. For the recipe, I used Peter Reinhardt's The Bread Baker's Apprentice Challah recipe. But instead of the SAF Red Instant yeast that I'll use for lean doughs, I used the Gold SAF Instant Yeast instead. And, for added richness, I replaced two of the eggs in this recipe with duck eggs.
Now, It's been a while since, I've braided anything, so I had to practice getting used to the tension in the bread dough, but we got there. I was so pleased with the beautiful the strands of petals weaving through the dough.