Olive Oil Brioche

The olive oil brioche that I'm bringing you today has nothing to envy of the classic French-origin sweet enriched with butter. In this brioche you will find all the virtues of the former but with the added benefit of extra virgin olive oil.

The crumb is spectacularly light, ethereal and tasty, achieved with only a few ingredients. Its golden crust will make you fall in love from the first bite. That said, this brioche has one downside… You won't be able to stop eating it, it's totally addictive!

To make this brioche, I opted for a Emile Henry ceramic mold about 23 centimeters. I chose to divide the dough into 3 equal pieces for a simple reason; baking 3 dough rolls in the same mold allows us to separate these pieces individually afterwards, yielding 3 brioche loaves.

This way we can store the pieces individually wrapped in plastic wrap and a freezer bag. They freeze wonderfully and when you need a slice, you just take out a piece and cut the slices you want. Even when frozen, don't worry, you can slice it without trouble. Then you have several options: put it directly in a toaster or let it defrost at room temperature.

It's very important that you use the right flour to make this brioche. You need a strong bread flour, with a minimum protein percentage of 13%. To know the protein percentage of a flour, it's as simple as looking at the nutritional information on the package and finding proteins in the table.

T&G acacia wooden paddle, Birkmann bread scraper and Pallarès carbon steel knife

Ingredients

• 500 g strong bread flour (13% protein)
• 10 g instant baker's yeast (do not confuse with baking powder Royal)
• 10 g salt
• 100 g honey
• 70 g extra virgin olive oil
• 2 large eggs + 2 egg yolks
• 150 ml water at 46 ºC

For brushing:

• 1 egg yolk with a little water

Preparation

1. Place the flour in the bowl of the mixer and, without stopping stirring, add the salt, the yeast and pour in the honey, olive oil, the eggs and the yolks.
2. Gradually add the water at 46 ºC while mixing at low speed with the dough hook attachment until all the water is incorporated.
3. Continue kneading at medium/low speed for about 7 minutes until the dough is smooth, shiny and no longer sticks to our hands. Let the dough relax for about 5 minutes.
4. After this time perform the windowpane test. This consists of stretching a piece of dough between our fingers, and if the gluten is well developed, a sort of translucent membrane will form when held up to the light. If it breaks when doing it, it means it needs more kneading.
5. Shape into a ball and place it in a greased bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature until it doubles in size. Approx. 2 hours.
6. Turn the dough out onto the work surface and punch it a couple of times to remove excess gas.
7. Divide the dough into 3 equal parts. Roll each of them out with the help of a rolling pin into a rectangle with a width equal to the mold you are going to use. Once each piece of dough is rolled up, you will have 3 brioche dough rolls.
8. On a mold with parchment paper at the base, place the 3 rolls side by side. Let rise at room temperature inside a large plastic bag for 1 hour.
9. Preheat the oven to 175 ºC top and bottom heat.
10. Beat the egg yolk with a little water. Brush the entire dough.
11. Bake 10 minutes at 175 ºC. After this time reduce the oven temperature to 150 ºC and bake 15–20 minutes. The brioche should be golden, shiny and with an internal temperature of about 87 ºC.
12. Let the brioche cool on a rack for at least 1 hour.
13. Once cold, the crumb will have settled and you will be able to slice it perfectly.

T&G acacia wooden paddle and Emile Henry ceramic tray

Note: This olive oil brioche, as is with nothing else, is exquisite. It is ideal to accompany both sweet and savory dishes. And if you let it harden for a few days you'll make some wonderful torrijas.