Brioche, the ultimate French bread which was for so many years exclusively enjoyed by the rich and aristocracy. Then Marie Antoinette apparently said, after she heard the poor people have no bread, “Let them eat cake!” After that, this rich, almost cake-like bread was given to the poor in stead of old-fashioned bread.

Brioche is a richer version of bread and has a much softer crumb, due to the addition of eggs and lots of butter! Butter, of course happens to be my favorite ingredient ever! Our South African counterpart is Mosbolletjies, it has the same texture, but it has the divine aromas of must and aniseed, heaven!

Photo: Tanya de Nobrega

Well, heaven is what you are looking at, isn’t it! When I found Tanya de Nobrega on Food 24, I could see from her lovely photos that she clearly has loads and loads of talent, but when I landed on her website, I was simply stunned!

Tanya is a trained Godon Blue Chef who works as a food stylist, photographer, writer and recipe developer in and around Cape Town! I will be chatting to her tomorrow morning just after 9 on RSG and can hardly wait. I have so many questions to ask her!

When Tanya wrote in her blog post that friends will go oooh and aaaaah looking at this delicious brioche, she was right! Those where my exact sentiments, gosh, it looks good doesn’t it! She was kind enough to take us through the steps on how to make this show stopper! No excuses now, let’s bake!

Photo: Tanya de Nobrega

Brioche with Sweet Berries, Hazelnut and Dark Chocolate Swirl

Yield: 1 x 20-30cm bread

Preparation time: 30 minutes plus +- 45mins – 1 hour rising time

Cooking time: 25-30 minutes

Ingredients

Dough

10g instant yeast

15ml brown sugar

187.5ml (3/4 cup) full cream milk, lukewarm
*It’s VERY important that the milk is no hotter than lukewarm & by this I mean only JUST warm to the touch – hotter than this & your yeast will die off & your precious bread won’t rise.
1 XL egg yolk
*Always at room temperature for baking.

30ml butter, melted
*Again, very important to let the melted butter cool down to lukewarm before adding to yeast mixture.

562.5ml cake flour

5ml salt

30ml treacle or brown sugar

Oil for greasing the bowl

For the Filling

62.5ml butter – room temperature
*a clever way to measure ml of butter is to place a certain amount (say 200ml) of cold water into a measuring jug, then add your butter and watch the rise in water level – the difference is your ml amount in butter

62.5ml brown sugar

15ml ground cinnamon

500ml fresh berries – sliced strawberries & blueberries
*You can use any fresh berries – blackberries and fresh pitted cherries would be amazing!

62.5ml hazelnuts, peeled, roasted and roughly chopped

125ml roughly chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chips
1 XL egg, beaten for egg wash

Icing sugar for dusting

Photos: Tanya de Nobrega

Method

Preheat oven to 180’C.
Pour the lukewarm milk into a measuring jug. Add the yeast and sugar and whisk together.

Add the egg yolk and melted butter and whisk again until thoroughly combined.

Allow the yeast mixture to stand for 5 minutes and get all foamy.

In the bowl of your mixer with the paddle attachment (or large mixing bowl) mix together the flour, salt and sugar.

Pour the milk mixture over the dry ingredients and mix until it pulls away from the edges of the bowl. At this point if you’re using a mixer, change to the dough hook attachment.

Knead the dough in the mixer for 8 minutes on a medium speed. If working by hand, place the dough ball on a lightly floured surface and knead for 10-12 minutes.

The dough ball should be smooth, damp and light to the touch, without being too sticky. Grease a large bowl with a mild oil.

Place the dough in the bowl and cover with clingfilm or a damp tea towel. Allow to rest at warm room temperature for around an hour, or until doubled in size.

While the dough rises, whisk together the butter with sugar and cinnamon for the filling. Set aside.
Get your fresh berries, chopped hazelnut and chopped chocolate ready.

Grease a 25cm cast iron pan. You can also use any oven proof shallow bowl or cake tin.

Once your dough is ready, knock it back.

Roll this out to a larger, thinner rectangle of about 30x45cm
Using a palette knife, spread your cinnamon filling evenly over the top leaving a 3cm border around the edges.
Sprinkle over your fresh berries, roast hazelnuts and chocolate.

Using a very sharp knife, cut the roll in half length-ways leaving 5cm of the side where you start uncut.

Twist open the two sides of the roll to expose the filling

Plait the two pieces by carefully lifting the one side over the other, repeating until you get to the end of the roll.
Seal the edges by pressing the ends together.

Join the ends and create a wreath shape with the dough. Press the ends together.

Quickly and carefully lift your wreath into the greased pan and brush with beaten egg.

Pop into the oven and bake for 25-40 minutes until golden brown and all sticky with berry goodness!

Allow to cool for about 20 minutes (if you can wait that long!) before dusting with icing sugar, slicing and serving.

Photo: Tanya de Nobrega

Tomorrow morning just after the 9 o’clock news, I will be  back in my seat at RSG studios, sharing this easy recipe with you! Get ready to be amazed! I will also in weeks to come take you into the kitchens of other bloggers, chefs and interesting South Africans this year. So buckle up, it is going to be an awesome ride. Tune in 100-104FM or listen online here!