Spelt – wheat – yeast plait

Ingredients for 4 servings:

• 250 g flour (wheat flour type 550)
• 115 g flour (spelt flour type 630)
• 10 g flour (rye flour type 997)
• 190 ml milk, 3.5% fat content
• 40 g butter
• 30 g sugar
• 1 bag of vanilla sugar, real Bourbon, 8 g
• 1 egg(s)
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 21 g fresh yeast = 1/2 yeast cube
• 1 pinch of ascorbic acid (vitamin C)
• 1 pinch of sea salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 egg(s)

Instructions

Working time approx. 25 minutes; Rest time approx. 3 hours; Total time approx. 3 hours 25 minutes

Inspired by the legendary Frieda braided bread. Here’s the more rustic spelt version

Sift flour into a large bowl and mix in a slightly heaped teaspoon of sea salt. Gently warm the milk and butter and pour into a mixing bowl. Add the sugar, vanilla sugar (1 sachet, or 2 sachets = 16 g), 1 pinch of vitamin C, and crumbled yeast. Mix everything together until the yeast is largely dissolved. Add a whole egg and whisk everything together well. This is best done briefly with an immersion blender, otherwise use a hand mixer. Pour this liquid into the flour all at once and knead the dough thoroughly. Spelt dough can easily be over-kneaded, so please don’t overdo it! 4 minutes with a hand mixer is perfectly sufficient. Adding the vitamin C increases the kneadability. It’s normal for the dough to seem a little too moist at first. Spelt expands more than wheat. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and a plate. Let it rise in a warm place for a good 2 hours. The dough should then at least double in size. Dust a baking surface with flour, place the risen yeast dough on it, and knead it lightly by hand again. Divide the dough into quarters and form four equal-sized sausages. These can be easily pulled in the air. Wrap two sausages around each other in a spiral. Do the same with the others. Then braid the two spirals together. Halve the braid lengthwise. Press the ends together. Braid again. This works best if you place the dough pieces on top of each other like an X and then intertwine them. Let rise for another hour, or up to 2 hours. For the glaze, beat one whole egg very well, preferably with a mixer, and add a teaspoon of sugar and a pinch of sea salt. This is very important because it prevents the egg-coated braid from turning black during baking. Sprinkle with granulated sugar or sliced ​​almonds, if desired. Bake at 200°C (400°F) for 15 minutes using top/bottom heat, then reduce to 170°C (348°F) – 180°C (350°F) and bake for another 30 minutes. Spelt baked goods generally don’t store well. This braided loaf tastes best fresh.