Instructions

1. In a very large bowl, or the bowl of your mixer, add yeast sugar and warm water.
2. Set aside and allow yeast to bloom for 8 minutes.
3. While yeast is blooming, combine oil, eggs, sugar, honey and vanilla.
4. Mix well.
5. When yeast mixture is very bubbly, pour in oil mixture.
6. Stir.
7. Add a little less than half the bag of flour (or 1, 1 kilo bag) to the bowl.
8. Turn the mixer on low or using a spoon, mix the flour into the liquid very well.
9. Mix for a good 2-3 minutes to help the gluten start to develop.
10. Add salt.
11. Mix till incorporated.
12. Add in 3/4 of the flour that’s left in the bag or the second 1 kilo bag of flour + additional 2 cups and mix.
13. If not using a machine, mix with a spoon until it becomes too hard to mix. At this point pour dough out onto your counter.
14. Knead for 8-10 minutes, either in the machine or by hand working in the remaining 1 cup of flour as needed.
15. Once dough is smooth and elastic, place back into the bowl or transfer out of your mixer into a lightly oiled bowl to rise.
16. Pour a little bit of oil into your hand and rub all over the dough.
17. Place a piece of saran wrap directly on dough and cover the bowl with a towel.
18. Allow to rise until it has at least doubled in size and then remove Saran Wrap, punch down, replace Saran Wrap and let it rise again.
19. (You can repeat this steps as many times as you need until you are ready to braid the dough.)
20. Braid your dough, place on sheet pan or in a tin and cover with a towel.
21. Let them rise for 45 minutes to an hour. (Don’t skip this step.)
22. Preheat oven to 350f (180c). (For circle challahs I lower the oven to 175c)
23. Brush challah with beaten egg and top as you like.
24. Bake for 25-45 minutes until challahs are deeply golden and cooked.
25. Remove pan from the oven, and allow to cool for 5 minutes.
26. Transfer challahs to a cooling rack and allow to cool completely.