- 2 2/3 cups plus 2 TBSP bread flour
- 1/2 cup plus 2 TBSP milk
- 3 TBSP Water
- 1 TBSP instant yeast
- 1/4 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 egg
- 1/4 cup butter
- Add the flour to a small saucepan and whisk in the water and milk, then cook, stirring over medium-low heat, until the paste is thick and the whisk leaves a clean spot in the pan when it's scraped on the bottom.
- Scrape starter paste into a bowl and set aside to cool.
- Melt the butter and then stir the milk into it.
- Once milk and butter cool, add the active dry yeast to the mixture and stir to combine.
- Put the dry ingredients into the bowl of a stand mixer.
- When the starter paste is cool, put it in the mixer bowl along with the milk, butter, yeast mixture, and egg.
- Mix and knead until a smooth shiny dough forms.
- Lightly grease a bowl, put the dough in, turn it to cover with oil.
- Cover the bowl and let the dough rise for 90 minutes or so.
- Grease a 9" by 5" loaf pan.
- Gently press the air out of the dough and divide it into quarters.
- Take one quarter of the dough and pat it into a three-inch by five-inch rectangle
- Fold both sides of the shorter ends of the dough in toward the middle and press it out into a rectangle again.
- Roll the flat piece up into a roughly rectangular shape once again and place it in the loaf pan.
- Repeat with the remaining quarters if dough.
- Cover the pan and let the rise for another 90 minutes or so; it will again be puffy but it won't change in size nearly as much this time
- Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and brush the loaf with the milk wash.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until baked through.