Braided Cinnamon Star Bread

Few months ago Gretchen from Gretchen’s Bakery and I decided to  collaborate each month, using a specific ingredient or a theme. This month we are doing all cinnamon theme. I decided to make braided star bread. It turned out beautiful and ooh so delicious.

• Sift  flour, add salt and sugar into a bowl of you mixer.
• Warm 1/4 cup milk, add 1 packages of
  dry yeast into the milk add pinch of sugar, stir and let stand for 5 minutes until bubbles
  form on the surface.
• In a small dish stir together remaining 3/4 cup warm milk, melted butter, oil, egg yolks, vanilla extract.
• Add wet ingredients into dry and knead
  on low speed, using a mixer equipped with a hook attachment. Knead until
  smooth and soft  dough forms.
• Invert dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead with a hand for a few minutes, or so until no longer sticky and it comes into a ball.
• Oil a large bowl and put the dough into
  the bowl, coat the dough with oil. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let
  the dough rise in a warm place, about an 90 minutes.
•  This dough is really nice to work with it is soft and shapes very easily.
• Once the dough has risen, dust the work surface with a little bit of flour, knead the dough until it forms a ball, divide into 4 sections.
• Roll out each section into a round, butter and spread cinnamon sugar on top. Lay another dough round on the top and repeat.
• To learn how to make the star shape, watch the video below.
• Once you have your bread shaped, let it rise again in a warm place for 60 minutes.
• Preheat oven to 350F
•  Brush egg wash on the top and sprinkle with some vanilla sugar or regular sugar.
• Bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden on the top.
• Remove from the oven, let cool for 20 minutes, you can cover the bread with a clean towel for this period of time.
• Transfer onto a plate and serve.

My Cinnamon Star is also part of a collaboration with Gretchen’s Bakery.
You can check out Gretchen’s Recipe for Cinnamon Bread here