Vegan Challah

Equipment

• Baking sheet
• Stand mixer and dough hook
• Parchment paper
• Spatula
• Pastry brush or grill brush
• Tiny bowl for glaze
• Measuring cup for liquids
• Scale (optional)

Ingredients

For the dough

• 580g flour (approx 4 cups)
• 13g salt (~1.5 teaspoons)
• 10g yeast (~2.5 teaspoons)
• 295g room temperature water (1.25 cups)
• Pinch of sugar
• 50g canola oil (about 0.25 cups)

For the glaze

• Dash of non-dairy milk
• Dash of agave nectar, maple syrup, molasses, whatever

Instructions

Make the dough

1. Stir together water, yeast, and sugar into your stand mixer's bowl. Let it rest for 5 minutes.
2. Put oil, salt, and about half of the flour into stand mixer's bowl.
3. Mix together with dough hook; you'll probably need to scrape sides down with a spatula.
4. Once everything's somewhat combined (don't stress too much about it), dump in the rest of the flour. Mix with dough hook until it comes together into a ball (i.e. there is loose flour in the bowl).
5. Mix with the dough hook for 2 minutes.
6. Pull dough off the hook and let it rest in the bowl for 10 minutes.
7. Remove the dough from the stand mixer's bowl, pour in a tiny bit of canola oil, and put the dough back in. Rotate the dough ball so that it's very lightly coated in oil. Cover with a plate.

First rise

1. Wait about 1.75-2 hours, until the dough has doubled in bulk.
2. When dough has doubled in bulk, punch it down, then braid into a challah loaf.

Second rise

1. Place on a parchment-lined cookie sheet and loosely cover in clean towel or plastic wrap. Wait for it to double in bulk, 45m-1h.

Baking

1. When doubled in bulk, prepare glaze by mixing equal parts of non-dairy milk and agave nectar (or whatever you're using). You don't need a lot.
2. Brush the glaze onto the loaf; sprinkle with sesame seeds or salt if you want.
3. Cook for ~30-35m at 350F.

Additional details about this recipe

This the recipe I've decided on after baking The Spruce's Vegan Challah for a while.