Whenever I go out to a restaurant to eat, I look around and it seems like half the tables are just as busy photographing their food as actually eating it.
I'll admit that I'm guilty of it as well, but when you're making food that looks as good as it tastes (like Rainbow Ice Cream Cakes or Gummy Bear Popsicles), how can you not photograph it?
As far as recipes go, I tend to avoid ones as complicated as breaking bread, but this rainbow bread recipe from the Rise and Shine Blog seems fairly manageable and the finished product is as beautiful as all the steps it takes to make it. They call it jelly bean bread for its amazingly vivid colors. The taste is light and sweet, but not as sugary as jelly bean.
INGREDIENTS:
- 1/2 Tbsp. sugar
- 1/4 cup warm water
- 1 tsp. active dry yeast
- 1/2 cup lemon juice, plus the zest of one lemon
- 1/3 cup honey
- 1 tsp. oil
- 2 large eggs, beaten
- 3/4 tsp. salt
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more as needed for kneading
- 6 pastel shades of gel food coloring
- 1 egg white beaten with 1 tsp. water
What do you think of this recipe? Do you like it as much as we do? Let us know in the comments!
Please SHARE if you love beautiful, delicious food projects like this one.
From the blog:
"In large mixing bowl combine warm water, sugar and yeast. Allow to proof approximately 5 minutes until foamy.
To the yeast mixture add the lemon juice and zest, honey, oil, eggs, salt and flour and stir until the dough wads up in a ball around the spoon. Add more flour if necessary to make this happen. Knead on a well floured surface for several minutes, adding flour as needed until the dough is smooth and tacky but not super sticky. It helps to wash your hands of any dough a couple times through this process."
"Break the dough into 6 equal size pieces. Wearing gloves, knead about 1/8 teaspoon of gel coloring into each ball of dough. Knead each piece of dough until the coloring is completely mixed in.
Transfer dough to an oiled platter or sheet pan, turning to coat the dough in oil. Cover with a kitchen towel. Leave to rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 1/2 hours."
"Punch down the balls of dough. Braid as shown above, rolling the dough on a lightly greased surface and braiding the dough on a parchment lined sheet pan."
To properly braid the dough:
"Take your balls of dough one at a time and create six strands about 16 inches long with slightly tapered ends. Line them up in rainbow order, or random if you prefer, and pinch at the top to secure the end. Then take the strand on the right and weave it to the left over two strands, under one strand and over two strands."
"Repeat with the next strand on the right, then the next on the right, and so on until you reach the bottom. Pinch the ends together and tuck them under the loaf."
Once the loaf is fully braided:
"Brush the dough with your egg wash. Cover with lightly greased plastic wrap and allow to triple in size, about 2 hours."
"Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Brush the loaf with another egg wash. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until lightly browned on top. Cool on a wire rack. Slice when slightly warm and serve with butter and honey.
The finished product is beautiful. If you're baking this for special events, you can even customize the bread with specific colors such as red and green for Christmas or red, white, and blue for Independence Day.
Please SHARE if you are also impressed with this amazing treat.
