Tricolour Braided Bread With Pesto, Sundried Tomatoes And Garlic
This is a bread which, if we’re honest, Italian bakers would probably only create for tourists, but we’re happy to embrace it nonetheless. The kids love ripping it apart and fighting over their favourite colour: the living embodiment of bourgeois family bliss.
Ingredients
- Plain flour – 500g/1lb/3 1/3 cups
- Lukewarm water – 300ml/10floz/1 ¼ cups
- Extra virgin olive oil – 2 tbsp
- Dried yeast – 1 packet
- Salt – pinch
- Pesto – 2 tsp (see our pesto recipe here)
- Sundried tomatoes in oil – 8, finely chopped
- Garlic – 2 cloves crushed
- Egg – 1 beaten, for brushing
Method
- Step 1
- Put the first five ingredients in a bowl, mix, turn out onto the kitchen surface and knead for 10 minutes. Leave in a warm spot (an airing cupboard is ideal), covered with a tea towel for 1 hour. Divide into three equal parts and knead pesto into one, the finely chopped sundried tomatoes into the second and garlic into the last.
- Step 2
- Roll each part into a long sausage, then braid them together. Pinch the ends and brush the braid with a little beaten egg. Place the braid on a baking tray and allow to rise for 30 minutes.
- Step 3
- Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/GM4. Bake the braid for around 35 minutes. It is done when, like a baby which needs feeding, it sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom Tear apart, give your sister a punch while your Mum’s not looking and dip in some more extra virgin oil.
