Challah for the risk adverse
January 14, 2023 10:17 AM Subscribe
If you're not supposed to leave raw eggs out for more than two hours, how is it food-safe to let challah dough, with raw eggs in it, rise on the counter for four or more hours? Side question: why is my challah so slow to rise?
Basically what it says above: my challah takes at least 4 hours to rise, really more, I think it needs 5-6 because it's not rising like it should most of the time. I don't totally understand how this is food safe to leave raw eggs out for so long. Is it just that the bread is cooked after rising?
My house is usually 70-ish degrees. I usually use Smitten Kitchen's recipe, but I've been modifying to do two rises instead of three over four or more hours because it takes a minimum of two hours to get any puff at all. Is there a way to make it rise faster? I make sandwich bread all the time and have no trouble with it rising in the time period the recipe calls for, with the same yeast and flour, so my ingredients should be fine. I make half the recipe (1 loaf) and knead for about 5 minutes in my kitchen aid.
Basically what it says above: my challah takes at least 4 hours to rise, really more, I think it needs 5-6 because it's not rising like it should most of the time. I don't totally understand how this is food safe to leave raw eggs out for so long. Is it just that the bread is cooked after rising?
My house is usually 70-ish degrees. I usually use Smitten Kitchen's recipe, but I've been modifying to do two rises instead of three over four or more hours because it takes a minimum of two hours to get any puff at all. Is there a way to make it rise faster? I make sandwich bread all the time and have no trouble with it rising in the time period the recipe calls for, with the same yeast and flour, so my ingredients should be fine. I make half the recipe (1 loaf) and knead for about 5 minutes in my kitchen aid.
Enriched dough normally takes longer to rise than regular dough, because it's wetter. You can speed it up by putting it somewhere warm (not hot), I often heat the oven to the absolute lowest setting and then put the dough in there with the door open.
posted by quacks like a duck at 10:34 AM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by quacks like a duck at 10:34 AM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Not to threadsit, but my understanding is that in the US eggs are cleaned in such a way that it’s no longer safe to leave them out on the counter because the protective coating is washed away. Does that not apply if they are out of the shell? I have small children, so food safety is more of a concern than it might be for adults.
posted by john_snow at 10:41 AM on January 14, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by john_snow at 10:41 AM on January 14, 2023 [4 favorites]
Best answer: OP is correct about USDA recommendations because eggs in the US are washed and also because they are refrigerated, so when they are brought to room temperature they sweat, which can cause bacteria to move inside the shell. More here.
The main concern, though, is salmonella, which is destroyed by cooking. This is why it's OK to eat cookies, but not to eat raw cookie dough. Since you are cooking the challah, it should be fine. (For the record, I ate a lot of raw cookie and cake dough as a child and never got sick from it.)
For making dough rise faster, are you just leaving it on the counter? Some of the things I've done to make dough rise faster are putting it on top of a dryer that was running and setting the oven at the lowest temperature, then turning it off for a while before putting in the dough. With the latter, it's probably best if you have an oven thermometer so it's not so hot it kills the yeast, though I've never had a problem with it. My grandmother used to put a few inches of hot water in the bathtub and then put the bowl with the dough in there.
posted by FencingGal at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023 [11 favorites]
The main concern, though, is salmonella, which is destroyed by cooking. This is why it's OK to eat cookies, but not to eat raw cookie dough. Since you are cooking the challah, it should be fine. (For the record, I ate a lot of raw cookie and cake dough as a child and never got sick from it.)
For making dough rise faster, are you just leaving it on the counter? Some of the things I've done to make dough rise faster are putting it on top of a dryer that was running and setting the oven at the lowest temperature, then turning it off for a while before putting in the dough. With the latter, it's probably best if you have an oven thermometer so it's not so hot it kills the yeast, though I've never had a problem with it. My grandmother used to put a few inches of hot water in the bathtub and then put the bowl with the dough in there.
posted by FencingGal at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023 [11 favorites]
Best answer: I wouldn’t leave North American raw eggs out that weren’t going to be cooked/consumed pretty quickly because it might hasten their end. However yes, you would smell that.
The worry about eating raw eggs is for salmonella and you’re fine because you’re not eating the dough raw. You’re conflating two different issues here. The risk to kids is eating eggs raw, not the eggs spoiling.
My kitchen is cooler and I’ve been making the Smitten Kitchen recipe most weeks for years. I do take the time for the three rises. The eggs and bread have always been fine. Enjoy!
posted by warriorqueen at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023 [3 favorites]
The worry about eating raw eggs is for salmonella and you’re fine because you’re not eating the dough raw. You’re conflating two different issues here. The risk to kids is eating eggs raw, not the eggs spoiling.
My kitchen is cooler and I’ve been making the Smitten Kitchen recipe most weeks for years. I do take the time for the three rises. The eggs and bread have always been fine. Enjoy!
posted by warriorqueen at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023 [3 favorites]
Yes, you shouldn’t leave US eggs on the counter because they’ve been washed. I have chickens and we wash our eggs (because ugh, coop poop) and we store them in the fridge.
Issue is longer term storage, though, not the time it takes to rise a challah or any other baked good. So no keeping washed eggs out on the counter for hours then putting them in the fridge to use next week. You’re not going to put that challah dough anywhere but the oven.
posted by lydhre at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023
Issue is longer term storage, though, not the time it takes to rise a challah or any other baked good. So no keeping washed eggs out on the counter for hours then putting them in the fridge to use next week. You’re not going to put that challah dough anywhere but the oven.
posted by lydhre at 10:52 AM on January 14, 2023
My oven has a setting for yeast dough proving. It's very cold for an oven, but warmer than your house: 35-40 C, which is 95-104 F. Perhaps your oven has a similar setting?
posted by ManyLeggedCreature at 10:55 AM on January 14, 2023
posted by ManyLeggedCreature at 10:55 AM on January 14, 2023
FYI, you won't be able to smell that an egg has been infected with salmonella. That is different from an egg that has gone bad for other reasons.
posted by FencingGal at 11:01 AM on January 14, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by FencingGal at 11:01 AM on January 14, 2023 [9 favorites]
Best answer: If you are worried, you can use pasteurized eggs. I've done that when I was cooking professionally, or just for all of the kindergarten.
That said, I agree with the others: eggs are mostly safe, and if they aren't you'll know it. I've had only one bad egg in my entire long life. Also, you bake them.
Since you are succesfull with your sandwich bread, I don't think the room temperature is the reason your bread isn't rising. There is a lot of yeast in that recipe and in my cold kitchen it would rise splendidly. You may be kneading too fast or too much or both. Maybe try hand kneading next time to see if that might be the reason, or just use the mixer for one minute and then finish it on a board.
posted by mumimor at 11:02 AM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
That said, I agree with the others: eggs are mostly safe, and if they aren't you'll know it. I've had only one bad egg in my entire long life. Also, you bake them.
Since you are succesfull with your sandwich bread, I don't think the room temperature is the reason your bread isn't rising. There is a lot of yeast in that recipe and in my cold kitchen it would rise splendidly. You may be kneading too fast or too much or both. Maybe try hand kneading next time to see if that might be the reason, or just use the mixer for one minute and then finish it on a board.
posted by mumimor at 11:02 AM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
Yep, strongly recommend using your oven to proof!
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 11:14 AM on January 14, 2023
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 11:14 AM on January 14, 2023
Best answer: From Hadassah Magazine's Challah Tips, Tricks & Troubleshooting:
Forget the recipes that indicate allotting 3 hours for your challah dough to rise. It’s gonna take as long as it takes, and you are a modern busy person who most likely doesn’t have that kind of time to just sit around and wait....
You can let it slow rise in the fridge, eliminating both concerns (though as others said, cooking kills salmonella).
posted by snuffleupagus at 11:14 AM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
Forget the recipes that indicate allotting 3 hours for your challah dough to rise. It’s gonna take as long as it takes, and you are a modern busy person who most likely doesn’t have that kind of time to just sit around and wait....
You can let it slow rise in the fridge, eliminating both concerns (though as others said, cooking kills salmonella).
posted by snuffleupagus at 11:14 AM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
I use my oven light as the source of warmth when my kitchen has a chill. Is your yeast elderly? I had some expired packets and didn’t realize it, and got no height on the bread I was trying to make.
posted by Lawn Beaver at 11:29 AM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Lawn Beaver at 11:29 AM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
I let my challah rise in the oven with the light on and the door closed.
posted by BlahLaLa at 12:11 PM on January 14, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by BlahLaLa at 12:11 PM on January 14, 2023 [3 favorites]
A lot of the new big toaster/convection oven/air fryer hybrid ovens have a proof setting too!
posted by potrzebie at 12:12 PM on January 14, 2023
posted by potrzebie at 12:12 PM on January 14, 2023
Best answer: A lot of the "one size fits all" rules for food safety ("don't leave prepared food out of the fridge for more than 2-4 hours" kind of things) are set at a threshold to keep ANY organisms from reproducing. This rule inherently excludes fermentation and bread rising! You want your yeast to reproduce. So you have to go to something more detailed than the usual 2-4 hour rule of thumb, which in this case is hundreds+ years of human experience with specific methods and organisms and outcomes.
Folks have good possible explanations here for why baking the bread after matters (vs. eating it raw), why specific organisms are different, and I'll add that in other forms of fermentation the presence of the desired organism (yeast or lactobacillus) can be protective as well by outcompeting (and creating an environment that's toxic to) any pathogenic bacteria that may have also been present at the start of the process. But in general, this is something we know is safe because it has a long track record of safety, and the broad easy-to-remember rules of thumb were created to cover all the other, riskier or unknown cases.
posted by Lady Li at 2:04 PM on January 14, 2023 [8 favorites]
Folks have good possible explanations here for why baking the bread after matters (vs. eating it raw), why specific organisms are different, and I'll add that in other forms of fermentation the presence of the desired organism (yeast or lactobacillus) can be protective as well by outcompeting (and creating an environment that's toxic to) any pathogenic bacteria that may have also been present at the start of the process. But in general, this is something we know is safe because it has a long track record of safety, and the broad easy-to-remember rules of thumb were created to cover all the other, riskier or unknown cases.
posted by Lady Li at 2:04 PM on January 14, 2023 [8 favorites]
Best answer: Another way to think about it is that an "egg" is a particular thing, an assemblage of water and protein and fat and other things. And an egg at room temperature is an environment in which salmonella bacteria (which also grows happily in chickens) can grow.
Once you mix an egg into a dough, though, it's not really "an egg" any more. The stuff that once was inside the eggshell is intimately mingled with different ingredients. The pH is different, the moisture level is different, the amount of oxygen available is different, the ratio of fats to proteins to carbohydrates is different, and the chemicals from the egg white and egg yoke even undergo chemical changes as they come into contact with other things, so the substance itself is different.
As a result, a dough is a different environment for microbial growth than an egg, and, as Lady Li points out, dough is a great environment for yeast and Lactobacillus to grow. And, as it turns out, not such a great environment for salmonella.
posted by BrashTech at 3:16 PM on January 14, 2023 [8 favorites]
Once you mix an egg into a dough, though, it's not really "an egg" any more. The stuff that once was inside the eggshell is intimately mingled with different ingredients. The pH is different, the moisture level is different, the amount of oxygen available is different, the ratio of fats to proteins to carbohydrates is different, and the chemicals from the egg white and egg yoke even undergo chemical changes as they come into contact with other things, so the substance itself is different.
As a result, a dough is a different environment for microbial growth than an egg, and, as Lady Li points out, dough is a great environment for yeast and Lactobacillus to grow. And, as it turns out, not such a great environment for salmonella.
posted by BrashTech at 3:16 PM on January 14, 2023 [8 favorites]
Best answer: For the rise, temperature control is key. This article gives a nice summary. Pretty much every time I've eer had bread not rise the way I wanted, it was because my kitchen was too cold.
If you are using dry yeast, start with a small amount of water that is about 100-110 degrees F to dissolve the yeast granules. Let that dissolved yeast water cool a little, and add a small amount of food (a spoonful of sugar or flour from the recipe). Keep that water in the 80-100 degree range until it gets frothy. Then you can mix it into your flour to make dough.
For a slow rise with more flavor, 8 hours or so in the fridge is good. For a rapid rise, get the temperature of the dough into the high 70s or low 80s and keep it there. An accurate, fast-reading food thermometer is really helpful. The easiest way to modify the temperature of your dough is to microwave the water before you add it to the dough. If the dough already has enough water, and it's too cold, you can find a warm spot in your kitchen, or use your oven's proofing setting, or even do a little low-power microwaving of the dough during the kneading process to bring it up fast. Just don't do it on high power or for more than a few seconds at a time.
posted by agentofselection at 4:38 PM on January 14, 2023
If you are using dry yeast, start with a small amount of water that is about 100-110 degrees F to dissolve the yeast granules. Let that dissolved yeast water cool a little, and add a small amount of food (a spoonful of sugar or flour from the recipe). Keep that water in the 80-100 degree range until it gets frothy. Then you can mix it into your flour to make dough.
For a slow rise with more flavor, 8 hours or so in the fridge is good. For a rapid rise, get the temperature of the dough into the high 70s or low 80s and keep it there. An accurate, fast-reading food thermometer is really helpful. The easiest way to modify the temperature of your dough is to microwave the water before you add it to the dough. If the dough already has enough water, and it's too cold, you can find a warm spot in your kitchen, or use your oven's proofing setting, or even do a little low-power microwaving of the dough during the kneading process to bring it up fast. Just don't do it on high power or for more than a few seconds at a time.
posted by agentofselection at 4:38 PM on January 14, 2023
Best answer: I find that the lengths of time specified in recipes are generally aimed at proofing-drawer temperatures, not northern hemisphere winter kitchen counter temps. I make my challah dough first thing Friday morning, and in the winter that first rise goes a good six or seven hours on the counter.
(Challah dough rises slower than white bread because of the eggs and oil, btw.)
As far as the eggs go, first of all, the "keep them cold" rule is for safety in case of a contaminated egg, and those are rare. But also, even in the unlikely event of trouble in the egg, the baking would kill it.
The answer to your question re "how to make the challah rise faster" is to use a proofing drawer or an oven that was turned on for a bit and then off. But the longer the rise the better the flavor, so a fast rise is not really desirable.
posted by fingersandtoes at 8:58 PM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
(Challah dough rises slower than white bread because of the eggs and oil, btw.)
As far as the eggs go, first of all, the "keep them cold" rule is for safety in case of a contaminated egg, and those are rare. But also, even in the unlikely event of trouble in the egg, the baking would kill it.
The answer to your question re "how to make the challah rise faster" is to use a proofing drawer or an oven that was turned on for a bit and then off. But the longer the rise the better the flavor, so a fast rise is not really desirable.
posted by fingersandtoes at 8:58 PM on January 14, 2023 [1 favorite]
I think that the recommendation of not leaving food out for more than two hours is conservative. You could probably leave food out for several hours and still be fine. The challah is also going to be baked afterwards, so it's even more fine.
posted by kinddieserzeit at 9:35 PM on January 14, 2023
posted by kinddieserzeit at 9:35 PM on January 14, 2023
Power washed US eggs or unwashed eggs (actually lightly washed/ rest of world) is a total red herring here: when you crack your eggs and make dough, It doesn't matter if they were US eggs from the fridge or UK eggs from the counter.
Letting dough rise for hours is ancient and safe imo, but if you think it's unsafe for any eggs, then it's unsafe for all eggs.
posted by SaltySalticid at 9:54 PM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
Letting dough rise for hours is ancient and safe imo, but if you think it's unsafe for any eggs, then it's unsafe for all eggs.
posted by SaltySalticid at 9:54 PM on January 14, 2023 [2 favorites]
Dough with eggs in it rising on the counter for four hours is not dangerous, I promise.
I can only cite a) having made hundreds of loaves like this with no adverse outcomes, b) having eaten scores of loaves from bakeries that do this with no problem, and c) growing up the son of an infection control specialist who would not blink at doing this.
Challah originated as an ultra-slow rise, naturally-leavened bread (as did nearly all leavened breads). If this practice were at all dangerous, it would have been abandoned long ago.
Note that using a warm environment to speed the rise can result in off-flavors, including an excessively beery taste and aroma. You want to taste the ingredients, and a normal-to-cool rise does that best.
posted by Caxton1476 at 9:19 AM on January 15, 2023
I can only cite a) having made hundreds of loaves like this with no adverse outcomes, b) having eaten scores of loaves from bakeries that do this with no problem, and c) growing up the son of an infection control specialist who would not blink at doing this.
Challah originated as an ultra-slow rise, naturally-leavened bread (as did nearly all leavened breads). If this practice were at all dangerous, it would have been abandoned long ago.
Note that using a warm environment to speed the rise can result in off-flavors, including an excessively beery taste and aroma. You want to taste the ingredients, and a normal-to-cool rise does that best.
posted by Caxton1476 at 9:19 AM on January 15, 2023
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Your bread is fine to rise. Bread has been rising for hours and days at a time for hundreds of years. It takes time to rise. Rise times vary. It’ll rise faster in a warm spot, but this isn’t something to stress over.
posted by shadygrove at 10:29 AM on January 14, 2023 [16 favorites]