Cinnamon Bread Wreaths
Julie O’Connor
Who doesn’t love the holidays for cooking, baking, indulging and imbibing? Its a worthwhile endeavor when so much of the fun is sharing your creations with family and friends who can dote on your sweet creations.
These wreaths are a woven, braided lush cinnamony dessert with pears baked in the middle. The dough is a 50/50 whole wheat flour/all-purpose flour mix, and the filling is a coconut/brown sugar mix (vs pure dark cane sugar) with ample amounts of Madagascar cinnamon.
The key is getting the dough just right, going slow, and preparing in advance, measuring out all ingredients and using a kitchen scale to get just the right amounts of flour, and consistency with portion sizes.
The leavening agent I used was active dry yeast. I chose yeast over baking soda or baking powders mostly for taste reasons, but I like that yeast is a biological leavening agent.
CINNAMON BREAD DOUGH
Adapted from Eva Kosmas Flores, Adventures In Cooking
Prepare the dough ingredients first.
INGREDIENTS
1/3 cup whole milk room temperature
2 teaspoons dry yeast
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup water room temperature
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 tablespoons apple sauce
2 teaspoons flake sea salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup unsalted butter room temperature
1 egg whisked with 1 teaspoon milk, for egg wash
CINNAMON SUGAR FILLING
4 ounces butter room temperature
1/4 cup coconut sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar (or brown cane sugar)
1/3 cup whole wheat flour
1 egg whisked
3 tablespoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon flake sea salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2-3 organic anjou pears cut horizontally in half then sliced thin
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat together the butter, sugars, flour, egg, cinnamon, salt, and vanilla extract at medium-low speed until smooth. Cover and set aside.
Make the dough
Whisk the milk and yeast together and allow to rest for 5 minutes.
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment, combine the milk-yeast mixture, flour, water, sugar, apple sauce or juice, vanilla extract, cinnamon, and salt at low speed until the dough just barely comes together.
Add the butter in thirds, mixing well after each addition. Continue mixing until a soft smooth dough forms, and the dough pulls away form the sides of the mixing bowl. The dough should form a smooth solid mass of dough around the hook, which will take about 5 minutes. If it seems too dry, spritz once or twice with filtered water from a small sprayer.
Transfer the dough to a well-greased bowl, cover it with plastic wrap, and allow to rise for 45 minutes at room temperature.
Pop the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 2 minutes.
Divide the dough into three equal parts. Use a kitchen scale here if you have one, to ensure that the three pieces of dough are equal weight for consistency.
Pat out each part into a rough rectangle shape, wrap in plastic wrap, and place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Refrigerate for 90 minutes.
ASSEMBLE the wreaths
After chilling, take one of the rectangles of dough and roll it out into a long rectangle.
Spread it with 1/3 of the cinnamon sugar filling, then roll it up along the longest edge as you would if you were making cinnamon rolls. Cover the roll in plastic wrap and place it in the refrigerator. Repeat with the remaining two rectangles of dough, and allow the rolled-up dough cylinders to chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
Take one of the cylinders and roll it on a flat clean working surface, lengthening it with your hands until the cylinder reaches about 28 inches in length. Cut it in half vertically, and then cut it in half horizontally as well, and set the two long strips aside.
Repeat with the other two cylinders.
To form the bread, take two pieces of dough longways and twist them together, pinching the ends (like a braid). Touch the ends together to form a circle, and pinch those together and place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
Repeat this process with all the pieces of dough, using two baking sheets lined with parchment paper and two wreaths per sheet (they will expand a lot when baking).
Cover each of the baking sheets with a greased piece of plastic wrap and set them aside to rise for 1 hour at room temperature.
Bake and Enjoy
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Place a pear slices in the center of each wreath with skin slivers up, in a circular orbit around the center of the dough wreath. Or, get creative here and add apple slices or whole fruit halves in the center for variety.
Lightly brush the bread with egg wash and bake it in the oven until deeply golden, about 35-40 minutes.
Remove from the oven and and serve warm!
Some Bread Chemistry: Leavening Agents
The leavening agent can be an important consideration for the type of bread you want. I used active dry yeast over baking soda or baking powders mostly for taste reasons, but I like that yeast is a biological, rather than a chemical leavening agent. In baking, leavening is the air that causes breads, cakes and other baked goodies to rise when they go in the oven. The type of air (or gas) is produced in different ways depending on which leavening agent you choose.
There are three main types of leavening agents: biological, chemical and steam.
Unlike the chemical leavening agents, yeast contributes flavor. Active dry yeast is what most recipes call for. It's a dry, granular yeast sold in packets or jars. Note that adding more yeast to a recipe won't cause the bread to rise more, but it will produce a more intense yeast flavor.
Proofing it at just the right temperature of about 105 degrees will unearth a wonderful flavor and rise in your bread doughs. Higher or lower temperatures could compromise your rise and consistency.
Yeast contains enzymes that are able to break down the starch in the flour into sugars. This glucose acts as food for the yeast, and it metabolises it to produce CO2 and ethanol. So yeast eats the sugars and they produce carbon dioxide (CO2) which causes gas bubbles to produce (the “rise”).
Because the dough is elastic, the bubbles expand without bursting, trapping the gas in the bubbles long enough for the heat of the oven to cook the dough. When the CO2 finally escapes, those air pockets hold their shape instead of deflating (due to the gluten network). The size of the air pockets determines the texture of your bread. Small air pockets produce a smooth texture, like a cake. Larger ones produce a coarser texture, like with a crusty bread.
