Remember how delicious Popeye made canned spinach look?  And then we found out that spinach is really kind of gross at times.  And canned spinach is really really gross all the time. Fortunately, the gross side of spinach doesn’t rear its ugly head in this week’s challah recipe.  The sweet deliciousness of the challah is accented by a mild spinach flavor and bright green color.  It’s really quite pleasant.  And healthy(ish)! I took a whole bag of fresh spinach and wilted it down to around a cup of cooked spinach.  You can use frozen, well drained spinach as well.  Just please don’t use canned spinach.  It’s not the same.  I added the cup of spinach to the normal challah recipe, which then required a little extra flour to compensate.  That’s about it. Green challah. Perfect for St. Patricks Day, and for the episode of Popeye where he was training for a marathon.

This one deserves the exclamation mark!  It’s that good! In fact, I might just end every sentence in this post with an exclamation mark!  Or not! It took a while to figure out the pretzelization process.  At first, I was trying to do it the way my bread machine cookbook said to do it, which was to boil the “pretzel” in plain water, 30 seconds, flip, 30 second, then dip in a baking soda and water solution (then bake it).  That works well for the bread machine’s pretzel dough, but not so well for challah.  The nooks and crannies of the challah braids would retain liquid and end up soggy and gross. Finally, a new cookbook came out that described how to make pretzel challah.  I didn’t follow the recipe for the challah (I think mine is pretty good as is), but this cookbook said to boil the challah in the baking soda-water solution (rather than plain water then dipped).  The solution is basically 1/3 cup baking soda to 4 cups of water.  In order to dip my 1-pound loaves I put 12 cups of water and a full cup of baking soda. Anyway, normal challah recipe, boil for 30-45 seconds, flip, 30-45 seconds, give it a quick drain with some wooden spoons, put it on your silpat, sprinkle with salt (I used kosher salt since I didnt have pretzel salt) and bake as usual. It looks really dark, but really, it’s “pretzel’d”.  And it’s AWESOME! Makes you wonder what else can achieve pretzel’d awesomeness by boiling in baking soda…  I’ll revisit this post later with a witty completion to that thought.

Eww… This one was an epic failure.  I don’t even want to talk about it.  bleh. Valentines day is all about chocolate dipped strawberries, right?  So, shouldn’t a challah of chocolate and strawberries be the perfect pre-Valentines Day challah?  You’d think so… right?  Am I really the only one?  I guess there’s  a reason for that. Anyway, it did not turn out well.  I used frozen strawberries rather than fresh, because I didn’t have any fresh ones, and when they defrosted they turned to liquidy mush.  I think, more than anything else, that’s why the challah was a failure.  The strawberries sort of broke down and made the rest of the challah soggy. I made the chocolate challah (cocoa powder added to the normal challah recipe), with some chocolate chips and the strawberries.  That’s how I did it.  And I tell you this purely because if we don’t learn from our mistakes we’re bound to repeat them.  If only the Oscars host-selection committee took as diligent notes as I do…

It’s Superbowl Sunday, and what goes better with the Superbowl than Chili!  And what goes better with chili than cornbread!  And what relevance does cornbread have with this site? When it’s challah! So, there you go.  Cornbread challah. I switched out 2 of the 8 cups of flour with cornmeal and added a little honey — maybe a tablespoon or so, and bam! Cornbread challah.  Yep, it was that easy!  And that good!  A little gritty, as cornbread sometimes is, but otherwise it was just like my son  — awesome Since it was baked for a Superbowl party, of course, I baked the mini challahs in a football shape.  It was well received.

Ok, so it’s not really that much of an experiment… but it was so good, I had to share it with you. I took the basic original egg challah dough and created some 2-ounce minis (that’s the size of all my minis).  After they baked and cooled, I took a knife and cut a small slit in the bottom of each.  I used a cake decorating piping tip and ziplock bag to inject normal strawberry jam into the middle (if I had a syringe, I would have used it, but the piping tip was adequate). I then made a batch of normal glaze (powdered sugar, a dash of vanilla and water) and drizzled it over the top. It was simply amazing!  The taste was spot-on with a jelly donut and the fresh, soft challah was easily mistakable for a real donut.  I’d HIGHLY recommend you try this next chanukah!

Some things are never as good when you make them at home.  Take Thai iced tea for example.  Have you ever made a glass of Thai iced tea that has the same “where have you been all my life” effect that it has when you get it in a restaurant?  No. The answer is no.  It’s because you think to yourself, “I have most of the ingredients, but I’m sure I can use non-fat half and half instead of sweetened condensed milk. Plus it’ll be healthier.”  Well, you’re wrong. But I digress.  For some reason, when I’m experimenting with a new challah recipe, I have this image in my mind that it’ll turn out exactly like the flavor I’m trying to mimic.  In this case, I figured that I could replace the water in the challah recipe with cranberry juice and lemon juice, add a little extra sugar, and end up with an amazing and airy challah with the sweet, tart and refreshing flavor of the raspberry lemonades I used to drink at the Cheesecake Factory, before I realized that it’s basically as bad for you (if not worse than) a big glass of regular Coke. Let’s just say, Thai iced tea or cranberry lemonade challah — not as good as you’d expect when you make them at home (see how I tied that all together? So nicely too). Next time, I’ll try adding some lemon zest and dried cranberries and see if it makes the difference.  They’re not terrible, just not great either. Oh well.  It was still fun and exciting… Right up to the very first bite.