Brioche too dark

[Bea]

I have made brioche two times now using the recipe from the King Arthur web
site.

I baked the it in a bread pan both times. The first time at 350° f for 40
to 45 minutes.

The crust came out too dark for my liking, the bottom crust was as dark as
the top crust
which had an egg wash on it. The bottom crust was almost black in spots and
had a slight
burnt taste

The second try I cut back on the baking time, 30 to 35 minutes and tented
the top with foil
for the last 10 minutes or so. I got the same results

Both times the crumb turned out really nice, light and tasty, and not under
or over baked.

The question is. Do I cut back even further on the baking time, or lower the
temp? Is there a
third possibility I haven't thought of?

[Boron Elgar]

My first suggestion would be to verify the temperature of your oven.

My second suggestion would be to make sure your bread pan is a decent
one, with no hot spots. Are you using a loaf pan or a brioche pan?

My third is that temps and times in recipes should always be looked
upon as estimates. There is no reason to leave the bread in any longer
than it needs to be in there. You know the joke about no one knowing
you're a dog on the Internet? Well, be careful with recipes you find
online, even from a trusted source like KA. Sometimes things just slip
through. Check out a few other recipes for brioche and compare them to
yours.

After you have tried the actions above, think about trying this:

After about 20 minutes, reach in and take the bread OUT of the pan you
are using. I am assuming from your recipe baking time, that the loaf
will be solid enough to perform this action. Check the internal temp
of the bread and then keep an eye on it. For a finished loaf, you are
looking for something between 190F and 195F for an enriched bread of a
size I am thinking you are making. Sometime I even take it a bit
higher, BUT, visual inspection is important, too.

And once you have the bread out of the pan, leave it out, so you can
more carefully monitor its color and temperature. Put it right onto
the rack.

Can you point me to the KA recipe you are using, please, so perhaps I
can help more? The recipe I see at first glance calls for 375F in the
oven and is linked below.

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/classic-brioche-recipe

Boron

PS....save me a taste! I LOVE brioche!

[Bea]

"Boron Elgar" wrote in message
news:cn6mi7diove6u9hff...@4ax.com...

Thank you for your advice.

Your correct. That is the exact recipe. I see now that the recipe calls for
a temp of 375°. Makes
me wonder where I got the 350°s from. I am thinking when it came time to do
the baking
I took a quick glance at the wrong recipe. I'll be trying it again in the
next couple of days. I'll watch it
closer. I like your idea of taking it out of the pan and putting it back on
the rack. I believe my pans
are fine. I've used them for other breads without a problem. I bought a
thermometer to check oven
temperature awhile back, things were spot on. However I forgot to remove it
the next time I cleaned the oven.
As you can imagine that didn't bode well for the thermometer.

PS: I'll let you know how I make out.

Thanks again, Bea

[Bertie Doe]

When I see the quack at the end of the month, I suspect he's going to put me
on a diet. So Tuesday I had a fling and baked Brioche. As Baron mentioned,
it's an enriched recipe, so the more sugar you use the darker it becomes.
I used a Richard Bertinet recipe from his book 'Crust' which uses 50g (2 oz)
sugar. If you compare the photo's in my slide show, they're only marginally
darker than the photo in RB's book.
I followed his bake-times which are pretty close to yours "375F for 10 mins
then 355F for 20 minutes. It produced a fluffy crumb and the dark crust was
nice and soft. His recipe was for 16oz flour, 8oz butter, no water and 6
eggs. He suggests an egg wash, but I used milk wash on 2 pans only, the far
left was unglazed. The 3 pans are 9" x 4" x 3". With hindsight I should have
used just 2 loaf pans and added a top layer of dough-balls as per Richard
B's Photo.

http://s222.photobucket.com/albums/dd220/BertieDoe/?action=view&current=cde0bb41.pbw


Photo from Richard Bertinet's 'Crust'
http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd220/BertieDoe/IMG_2749.jpg