Cherry Braided Bread
This week I saw a punnet of British Cherries in the supermarket and it reminded me of this Cherry Bread I made a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately this was before I could get my hands on the British cherries at all.
I love cherries as you can probably tell from all the cherry recipes: cherry mince pies if you were really organised you could start thinking about making your mincemeat now, cherry bakewell cake, cherry and almond bread and a cherry teabread. Not even to mention the other draft posts I have for cherry recipes…
A couple of weeks back I bought a whole lot of cherries, while they were on special offer, most of them were just popped into my mouth and stone popped back out. (On a side note if anyone knows a way to eat cherries in a lady like manor – then do please let me know!). But some spent too long in the fridge, and went too soft. These I made into a compote, with sugar and limoncello (I had no kirsch).
But what to do with this compote? Plain ice cream and a tablespoon of compote would have been fabulous, but instead I slightly altered a recipe I’d been meaning to try for quite a while.
Smitten Kitchen’s Lemon Braided Bread. The great thing about the basic recipe is that it could be filled with almost any fruit or if you’re less fruit inclined there is always chocolate! In fact chocolate would be so amazing that I will try this recipe again, maybe with Nutella instead of compote.
This recipe impressed me by just looking so darn cute, with the long braid, I was also pleasantly surprised that after my previous forays into braided dough – this one was much simpler to get right!
Instead of a pony tail braid, in this bread you are very much faking it, you are basically just folding strips of bread dough all the way down. The most complicated part of this whole recipe is moving the braid from where you created onto a baking sheet.
My baking sheets are all too small to fit the rolled out dough on, so I couldn’t just make it in place. Deb came up with a wonderful suggestion of making it on parchment paper and then just transfer the paper to the baking tray – unfortunately I didn’t read that bit till it was way too late!
I really loved this bread, despite the problems I had getting it onto the baking tray, and the fact that I cooked for 10 minutes longer than I should have. The cherries weren’t too strong, but just enough to lift the bread, and the cream cheese filling only gave it a creamy texture, yum.
Recipe Links:
Lemon Braided Bread, instead of adding vanilla extract to the dough, I add almond extract instead. (As cherries and almonds go so well together).
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July 25th, 2010 at 2:52 pm
This braid absolutely looks cute and it’s great to see the bright purple color of cherries in the middle of a bread. Never tried cherries in bread. And thank you for giving the tip of making the braid on parchment paper.
July 25th, 2010 at 3:28 pm
This looks absolutely wonderful! I need to get myself a cherry pitter….
July 25th, 2010 at 4:13 pm
Braided breads with fruit fillings are very appealing, I wish I had a slice of yours for breakfast!
Patty Price … Blueberry Nectarine Cake
July 26th, 2010 at 6:16 am
That, my dear, this a thing of beauty! If I only had the patience today…
July 26th, 2010 at 3:21 pm
Hi Lauren, What a great recipe! I am like you , love – love cherries. We’ve been eating cherries by the kilo since June & still seems like we can’t get enough. I love all your cherry recipes. Thanks for the links to the easy dough.
Oh and nope I think there is now “lady like” way of eating cherries
Nancy aka Spicie Foodie … More Awards and Matcha Madness
July 26th, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Hiya Nancy, think you might be right, definitely no lady like way of eating cherries.
Cathy – I don’t actually have a cherry pitter, I do it all painstakingly with a knife. I can’t bare the thought of buying any more one purpose utensils!
Sommer – it is quite pretty
It’s not actually that difficult, unless you count all the time waiting for bread to rise! Once I start making something I just want it to be over as soon as possible, and ready to eat.
Patty – it was very good for breakfast, and it actually kept quite well (not that there was an awful lot left for keeping)….
Zerrin – you must try cherries in breads, they are amazing! Although I might like them even more in cakes
January 31st, 2011 at 6:22 pm
I realize this is way overdue, but I’ve had great success with a paperclip in pitting cherries. Open it out flat, so the two loops are opposite each other in a kind of elongated S-curve and use the smaller of the loops to insert in the stem end. Stick it in far enough to get to the end of the pit, angle it a bit, and pull out the pit. It works pretty well in not mangling the cherry and you can’t argue with the price.