Gift baskets are so overrated, aren’t they? So, how do you pull off a gift with a little twist? Just pile up some fruits inside a bread basket. Now, hold on, you might not know how to make up.
And, that’s perfectly fine. I mean, that’s why you’re reading this article, isn’t it? We’ll show you how to make bread baskets! So, prepare to surprise your friends with a basket that you can even eat!
This might seem a bit complicated, but don’t fret. The process is as simple as making bread. And, you’ll definitely be surprised to know how easy this process actually is once you make your very own bread baskets!
Just make sure you follow the recipe and the steps perfectly because you might easily mess up the consistency of things if you don’t. With that out of the way, let’s get started.
All the Equipment That You’ll Need
Here’s a look at some of the tools you’ll need to get this recipe perfect.
- One bundt cake pan
- A silicone mat for baking
- A light sifter
- One kitchen scale for accuracy
- A medium kitchen bowl
- One double boiler
- A rolling pin for the dough
- Some sheets of baking paper
- A kitchen brush
- One dough scraper
- Copper wire
- A pastry bag
All Ingredients
Now it’s time for you to find out what goes into this beautiful creation. Let’s talk about the ingredients.
- All-purpose flour, 1000 grams
- Yeast, 30 grams
- Sugar, 25 grams
- Milk, 250ml
- Water, 150 ml
- Lard, 60 grams
- Butter, 60 grams
- Salt, 1 tsp
- One egg
- Chocolate coating (optional)
- Icing sugar (optional)
Make sure that you keep all the ingredients at room temperature. If the eggs came out of a fridge, make sure they rest for at least half an hour to reach room temperature.
Steps You Should Follow
Carefully read through the steps and follow them in their correct orders;
Step 1: Prepping the Yeast
First and foremost, you need to get your yeast ready. You may use ground yeast or fresh baker’s yeast. If you do opt for the latter, you need to crumble it up a little.
Take half of the milk in a container and add in the yeast. Then add the sugar into the mixture and stir with a spoon. Try using plastic or wooden spoons, as metal spoons might kill the yeast sooner.
If you’re using dried-up yeast, you need to make sure it’s rehydrated before use. In this case, you must add warm water to the dry yeast and let it rest for fifteen minutes.
You can then add the sugar into the mixture and let it rest again for half an hour.
Step 2: Prepping the Flour
Now, it’s time to get your flour ready. This bit is pretty simple, and you’ve probably already done this countless times if you’re an avid baker. Take the 1000 grams of flour and pour it into the sifter.
This additional step makes sure there aren’t any lumps in the flour. Everything that comes out of the sifter is fine granules of flours. You will even get fluffier bread with this step.
Step 3: Making the Mother Dough
Now it’s time to make the mother dough. You’re done with the yeast mixture and the flour now. Now, you need to put them together. You can either do it with a stand mixer or with your bare hands.
Just pour the yeast mixture onto the sifted flour. Keep kneading for a few minutes to get your dough ready. You’ve probably already made the dough a ton of times, the process is pretty much the same.
Step 4: Fat Tempering
Take the lard and the butter into a double boiler and heat them in the next step. Make sure you melt them till you have a golden liquid. After you’re done melting, let it rest for a few minutes. You’ll need to pour it into the dough so it shouldn’t be too hot.
If it does end up being too hot, the yeasts in the dough will disintegrate earlier. This would result in a flatter and non-aery dough. Add all the ingredients together at this point and knead again.
Step 5: Resting the Dough
After you’re done with kneading the dough, you need to let it rest for half an hour. Keep it covered with a towel or a cling film to get the best results.
Thirty minutes should be enough for the dough in this recipe. Then take it out of the bowl and put it gently onto the baking sheet. Now, you need to roll the dough with a rolling pin quite a few times.
Roll it out into a rectangular shape and make sure that the entire sheet of dough is around your finger’s thickness. Now you have to cut them with a dough scrapper into 24 different strips.
Step 6: Weaving
This is the fun part, and this is where you can get super creative. Out of the 24 strips, use 20 strips to create a woven pattern. This will be the base of your breadbasket.
You should also roll two of the strips into a base for the basket. Otherwise, the basket would tip over a bit too easily.
Now you need to make the handle of the basket in a similar fashion. Create another pattern with multiple strips to give it a bit of rigidity. Make sure you end up with a U-shape so that you can use this as the handle of the basket.
Step 7: Baking
Brush all the parts with an egg and get everything covered with the egg wash. You should preheat your oven to 220 degrees C. Then, you have to place the pieces into the oven for 15 minutes. Bring them out and then bake them on baking paper again for another 10 minutes.
Step 8: Putting Things Together
You’ll need sugar water to act as glue for all the pieces. Glue the base onto the big basket and then glue the handle on to sides of the basket. The sugar-water solution will be enough to hold things together.
Final Words
Pretty simple, wasn’t it? From this article, you probably learned a thing or two about how to make bread baskets. You do need a bit of patience, so don’t haste. It’s important to give time to the basket for the glue to dry.
