Einkorn Champagne Babas #BreadBakingBabes
 
 
These Einkorn Champagne Babas are festive, melt-in-your-mouth morsels made with einkon flour, baked in panneton papers, and soaked in champagne.
Author:
Recipe type: Einkorn Campagne Baba
Serves: 1 large, 6-8 small or 12 mini Babas
Ingredients
Sponge:
  • 100 grams water
  • ¾ teaspoon instant yeast
  • 1 tablespoon sugar
  • 100 grams all-purpose einkorn flour
Dough:
  • 120 grams all-purpose einkorn flour
  • 60 grams whole grain einkorn flour, home-milled
  • ¼ teaspoon fine salt (reduced from ½ tsp)
  • ¼ teaspoon instant yeast
  • 1½ teaspoons vanilla sugar
  • 3 large eggs
  • 90 grams / 6 tablespoons melted butter, slightly cooled
Soaking syrup:
  • 150 grams sugar
  • 150 grams water
  • 120 grams champagne (or Asti Spumante or fruit juice)
Glaze:
  • 200 grams apricot jam (or use sugar glaze), optional
Instructions
  1. Mix all the ingredients for the sponge together in a large bowl (the one you’ll be kneading the dough in). Now sprinkle 180 g bread flour over the sponge, so it is covered and leave to rest for about 1 hour.
  2. Now add the salt, ¼ tsp dry yeast, vanilla sugar and eggs. Start to mix this. If using a stand mixer, use the paddle attachment. When it comes together after a few minutes, add the melted (and slightly cooled) butter and keep working it. The dough is a bit batter-like, but be sure to get some gluten developed.
For one large Baba:
  1. Place it in the moulds. You can use a loaf tin or a round baking form, filled about half way up. Cover with plastic and leave to rise until 2-3 cm under the rim of the mould.
  2. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 180ºC (350-360ºF).
  3. Bake for about 45-55 minutes, until golden brown on top. If the bread gets too dark too soon, protect the top with a sheet of tin foil. Check the temperature in the bread with a thermometer, it should be about 93ºC. Take out of the oven and the tin and place on a deep dish. Poke the bread with a long wooden skewer from top to bottom. Brush the syrup all over it, and get as much as possible inside the bread, so take your time. Collect the syrup from the plate and keep pouring and brushing it, until all in absorbed in the bread.
For small or mini baba’s:
  1. Grease a tray with small or mini moulds and divide the dough in them. The dough shouldn’t be filling more than half of the shapes. Cover with plastic and let rise until almost to the rim.
  2. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 180ºC (350-360ºF).
  3. Place in the preheated oven and bake for about 18 minutes, The baba’s should be golden on top. Check the temperature in the bread with a thermometer, it should be about 93ºC or a wooden skewer inserted in the middle should come out clean.
  4. Take them out of the oven and out of the mould. Place them in a wide shallow dish in one layer. Pour the champagne syrup over the baba’s. Keep turning the baba’s one by one on all sides, including top and bottom, until all the syrup is absorbed.
Topping and serving:
  1. Now heat the apricot jam in a small pan and let it boil, add a little water if it is too thick. Brush or pour it over the top. You can also opt for a simple sugar glaze. This topping keeps the moisture in. If you eat the baba’s on the baking day, you can also skip the topping
Notes
For an extra festive feel, serve with whipped cream and fresh fruit or jam.

The baba is best eaten on the day that it’s baked. If you have any leftovers, cover with plastic wrap and keep in the fridge. Enjoy warm or cold.

Inspired by Beth Hensperger recipe
Recipe by Bread Experience at https://www.breadexperience.com/einkorn-champagne-babas/