Purim Recipe: Prune and Chocolate Bread

Folks, this is  seriously ugly bread.

On the other hand, it’s delicious.

Dangerously, decadently delicious.

Having an entire loaf of this around is like having brought a full bag of pastries home from the bakery.

I’d always wondered about prunes and chocolate together. I once bought a cake based on the combination. It was heavy as a lead bomb and I threw it out. But the photograph in Bread, by Eric Treuille and Ursula Ferrigno, was so interesting that I said, What the heck, and baked it.

Oh, my.

Chocolate sweetness and and sweet/tart prune, held together in a sweet dough. Rich – did I say this is rich? And it’s not light. But not cloying at all. And so what if it’s, er, beauty-challenged? Some faces grow on you.

If you still have time to bake for Purim, try this. Cut thick slices, wrap each one up, and put them in your Purim baskets.

Prune and Chocolate Bread

Recipe taken from Bread by Eric Treuille and Ursula Ferrigno

Printable version here

Ingredients:

1/2 cube fresh yeast – 4.5 teaspoons dry active yeast

1-1/2 cups – 12 fl. oz. water

4 1/2 cups  white flour

1-1/2 teaspoon salt

5 tablespoons-  1 oz. margarine or unsalted butter

2 cups -7 oz. -  pitted prunes, chopped

2 cups -  7 oz. chocolate, chopped (I used chocolate chips)

1 beaten egg

Method:

1. Put the yeast in a small bowl and dissolve it with 1/2 cup of the water.

2. Put the flour and salt in a large bowl and mix.

3. Make a well in the flour/salt and pour the yeast water into it.

4. Mix the flour in, adding more water as needed to make a soft dough. It should be sticky.

5. Knead the dough till all the flour and water are incorporated, 5-10 minutes.

6. Put the dough into a floured bowl. Cover it and let it rise for 1 hour or until doubled.

7. Preheat the oven to 350°F – 180° C.

8. Push the risen dough down and knead it a few times. Cover it again and leave it alone for 10 minutes.

9. Add the prunes, chocolate, margarine or butter and the egg. Squish everything in with your hands, it works much better than trying to beat the dough with a spoon.

10. Lightly flour your work surface and knead the dough just a minute or two, till it can hold a shape.

Now you get to decide if you prefer one large round loaf to slice, or 8-10 buns. In the latter case, tear off lumps, shape them roughly, and bake them only 25-30 minutes.

11. Cover the loaf (or buns) and let it rise 30 minutes or until it’s light.

12. Bake for 45 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

Note: the recipe calls for baking this in a greased 1 kg loaf pan, but I saw that the dough was too big to fit into mine. So I baked it as a boule. Less convenient to slice, but somehow impressive.

Don’t you just love that little punim?