Herbed Garlic Breads

I love baking different kind of breads, not sure why but even if I go to a buffet I get attracted to all kind of breads and would love to taste them. My pre-teen niece wanted to learn baking and came home to stay with us for few days. I thought this would be a good simple recipe to start off with. It has the same bread base but in different shapes so its fun to work on the designs and see it being baked.

Ingredients:

All purpose flour/maida – 500 gms

Active Dry Yeast – 4 spoons

Oil – 2-3 spoons (and some more for applying after the dough is set)

Butter – 3-4 spoons

Garlic – 4 pods finely chopped

Chilli flakes – 2 spoons

Herbs – 3 spoons finely chopped ( you can use whatever herbs you like)

Water – as needed

Salt – as needed

Step 1:

Add 4 spoons of yeast and warm water, mix it until it’s all dissolved. If you are using instant yeast, you can skip this step and add in it the flour directly.

Step 2:

Add in the all purpose flour or maida and give it a good mix with 2-3 spoons of oil, water and salt as needed.

Step 3:

Once the kneading is completed into a smooth dough, apply oil on the dough and cover it with a damp cloth. Wait for an hour for the dough to raise and in double in size.

Step 4:

After an hour, once the dough has raised, punch it and make into a smooth dough again.

Step 5:

At this stage, you can start preparing the designs for the bread. I have tried braided breads, knots, roll and flower. Braided design is simple as braiding the hair, you need to take 3 strands of dough and start working with each strand one by one. I have tried here one with 3 and 4 strands braid. For flowers, you can create smaller rolls and fix it up with each other to form the pattern. Once the bread designs are completed, leave it for 10-15 mins for it raise.

Step 6:

In the meantime, prepare the herbed garlic butter mixture. Melt butter and add in the chopped garlic, chilli flakes and the herbs ( I have used basil and fennel from my terrace garden here). Once its all mixed well, you can brush it on top of the bread.

Step 7:

Pre-heat the oven for 10 minutes and bake in the breads at 225 deg for around 10-15 minutes (I keep telling this again and again, the timer and temperature works differently for each oven, so I would leave it you for the best bet on choosing both the parameters)

Step 8:

Once its baked, apply butter on top and enjoy the breads with soup or as evening snack with tea.