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Monday, July 30, 2012

Stuffed Bread

Another exciting bread recipe from your favourite home cook and friend. My parents who had visited us recently were pleasantly surprised with my newly acquired bread making skills.
Hope you would definately enjoy this recipe - Spicy, peppery filling with chicken, mushroom and onion stuffed in braided buttery bread is a match made in heaven :)
Ingredients:
Bread-
All purpose flour (Maida) - 3 cups
Water - ¾ cup, Luke warm
Milk - ½ cup, Luke warm
Butter - 100 gms, melted, cooled to room temperature
Dried active yeast - 2 tsp
Sugar - 2 ½ tsp
Salt - 1 ¾ tsp
Egg - 1 small, beaten with 1 tbsp water (egg wash)

Filling-
Onion - 2 large, finely sliced
Pepper - 3-4 tsp
Coriander powder - 1 tsp
Garam masala - ¾ tsp
Curry leaves - 3 strings, chopped
Chicken - 200 gms (breast or boneless thigh) , cut into thin slices
Button mushroom - 200 gms, sliced
Lemon - 1 medium sized, squeezed
Oil - ¼ cup
Jeera - 1 tsp
Coriander leaves - ¼ cup, chopped
Garlic - 10-12 cloves, ground
Garlic - 2", ground
Salt to taste

Method:
In a bowl, mix milk, water and butter, dissolve the sugar, salt and yeast in it. Leave the yeast mixture for around 15 minutes. Take flour in a large bowl, form a well in the middle, add the yeast mixture little by little, keep mixing the flour with the help of a fork. You can also use a hand blender with kneading attachment. If you feel the mixture is quite loose, cover it with a damp towel and leave it for couple of minutes before you start working on it again. Dust a flat surface with flour and knead the dough thoroughly on the surface to activate the gluten. Do this for around 4-5 minutes. Leave the dough in a bowl, cover it with a damp cloth for 3 - 4 hours (depending on the weather; yeast requires warm and humid surrounding conditions to do its thing and rise the dough).

Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a pan. Now add the mushroom, saute for a while. Let it sweat out all the water, add 1 tsp black pepper and salt. Saute till all the water has been evaporated. Now sprinkle some ½ of the lemon juice. Take it off the flame and let it cool down completely. Once cooled, spread it on a cutting board and roughly chop the mushroom.
Marinate chicken in the rest of the lemon juice and some salt for around 30 minutes. Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a pan, add the marinated chicken, saute and cook till just done. Switch off the flame. Once cooled, spread it on a cutting board and roughly chop.

In a shallow pan, heat the rest of the oil, splutter some jeera, add in the sliced onions. Saute till translucent and just about to turn brown. Throw in the ginger and garlic paste, saute till it gives off the raw flavour. Now add the curry leaves, saute for another 2-3 minutes. Add coriander powder, garam masala and rest of the pepper powder, mix for a minute. Add mushroom and chicken. Adjust the seasoning, cook for another 5 minutes. Switch off and let it completely cool down.

Your dough would have now doubled (or even more) in size. Dust a flat surface and knock out all the air from the risen dough, knead it couple of times. Divide the dough into two equal parts. Roll each of the dough balls into rectangular shape roughly sized 8" by 12" and about 1 to 1.5 cm thick. Leaving around 3" in the middle (3" by 12" for laying the filling), make inclined cuts to form 1" finger strips on either sides. Now place equal amount of filling in the both the dough batches, sprinkle the chopped coriander over the filling. Fold the top and the bottom edges of the dough on top of the filling. Now fold the finger strips laying it over the filling to form braid like structure. Place it over a baking tray and let it proof for around 1 to 2 hours.
Now brush the egg wash gently (do not apply pressure, they are very delicate at this point). Pre-heat the oven to 180ºC. Bake the bread @ 180ºC for around 35 minutes. Once done, take it off the oven, brush some oil on the top to avoid a hard crust. Take the bread out of the tray and on to a wire rack for cooling.