It’s hard to imagine a Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah) celebration or Shabbat dinner without challah. It’s surprisingly easy to transform this classic, traditionally made with eggs for tenderness and golden hue with this amazing egg-free vegan challah bread recipe.
This vegan challah bread may not be exactly like version containing eggs, but it comes closer than any vegan versions I’ve tried, and is beautiful to behold, besides.
It may not be the challah that the Eastern European bubbe (grandmother — or even more likely, your great grandmother) in your life might have made, but it comes close enough.
Delicious fresh and warm served with your favorite honey substitute for the Rosh Hashanah celebration (agave and maple syrup work well), and vegan butter any other time.
Find out lots more in All About Challah:
The Traditional Shabbat & Jewish Holiday Bread
Tips for making fantastic vegan challah bread
The pull-apart texture and golden color: My first couple of attempts fell flat, almost literally. Then I remembered a recipe by Alisa Fleming of Go Dairy-Free, in her book of the same title.
Her recipe for Tender Squash Dinner Rolls, which extols their soft, pull-apart texture, adds a bit of pureed squash. So it’s with a big thanks to Alisa for the inspiration for my most successful attempt at vegan challah.
Braiding the dough is what gives challah its distinctive character. Basically, you pinch three sections of dough together, and overlap them (no differently than how hair is braided) until there’s no more to overlap. The opposite end is pinched together as well.
Traditional challah is brushed with an egg or milk wash; here we use plant-based milk or aquafaba. This is entirely optional.
The dough spreads quite a bit on the baking sheet as it bakes, so you may need to use two baking sheets if yours are small. To make a stronger loaf that rises a bit higher, add 2 tablespoons of vital wheat gluten to the flour mixture.
How to serve challah bread for Rosh Hashanah: Spreading chunks of challah with honey, along with the honey-dipped apple slices, are central to the celebration of the Jewish New Year.
Obviously, this part of the ritual needs tweaking for committed vegans (who don’t use honey), but it doesn’t take much more than swapping in maple syrup, agave, or 2-Ingredient Vegan Date Caramel.
All photos above by Hannah Kaminsky, BittersweetBlog.com.
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Vegan Challah Bread
It’s hard to imagine a Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah) celebration or Shabbat dinner without challah. And it’s surprisingly easy to make egg-free vegan challah bread.
Ingredients
- 1 package active dry yeast
- 1 1/2 cups warm water, divided
- 2 tablespoons natural granulated sugar
- 1/3 cup safflower or other neutral vegetable oil
- 2 tablespoons agave nectar
- 6 cups unbleached white flour, plus more, as needed (see Note)
- 2 tablespoons vital wheat gluten, optional (see Note)
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1 cup well-cooked pureed winter squash (any golden-orange variety) or canned pumpkin puree
- Unsweetened plant-based milk for brushing loaves (see note)
- Sesame or poppy or sesame seeds for topping
Instructions
- In a medium bowl, combine the yeast with 1/2 cup of the warm water and the sugar. Let stand for 5 to 10 minutes, or until dissolved. Stir in the oil, agave nectar and the remaining cup of warm water.
- Combine the flour, optional gluten flour, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Make a well in the center and pour in the wet mixture and squash puree. Work together, first with a large spoon, then with hands. Add more flour until the dough loses its stickiness; you’ll probably need about 1/2 cup more, depending on how tightly you packed the measured flour.
- Turn the dough out onto a well-floured board. Knead for 6 to 8 minutes. Place in a floured bowl, cover with a tea towel, and put in a warm place to rise until doubled in bulk, 1 1/2 to 2 hours. I like to turn the oven on, and just as it starts to heat up, turn it off. This seems to be a perfect spot for letting the dough rise.
- Punch the dough down, then turn back out onto the board, once again well floured.
- Divide the dough into two parts, then divide each of those into three parts, for a total of six. Make long strands, about 1 1/2 inches in diameter, from each part.
- Attach three strands at one end by pinching together. Braid the strands and pinch together at the bottom. Repeat with the remaining three strands of dough.
- Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet and let rise until in the same warm place doubled in bulk again, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 350º F.
- Brush the tops of the braids with a tiny amount of plant-based milk and sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds. Bake for about 30 to 35 minutes, or until the tops are golden and the loaves feel hollow when tapped. Cool on a rack until at room temperature before serving.
- To serve, cut into slices or just pull apart into chunks.
Notes
If you’d like a bit more wholesomeness to this loaf, go ahead and use 1 cup whole wheat bread flour or light spelt flour in place of 1 cup of the unbleached white flour. If you use more than than this, it will change the texture of the challah, making it more of a “health loaf” than a holiday bread.
Add this small amount of wheat gluten if you'd like a slightly stronger loaf that rises higher rather than spreading.
In place of plant-based milk, you can also use aquafaba (the liquid in canned chickpeas).
Apple-Cinnamon Peanut Butter Bostock is delicious way to use up extra vegan challah bread and apples.
I’d LOVE to make this challah but I cannot eat oil. Do you have a suggestion to replace it?
Carla, my best suggestion (really just a theory) is to replace the oil with applesauce. I can’t guarantee that the challah would be quite as tender, but it’s worth a try! If you do go ahead with it, let me know the result!
Sounds amazing. Can I just confirm that the flour to be used is plain white flour, not white bread flour?
Great question! I generally used organic unbleached white flour, but white bread flour could be an even better choice. In fact, I’m curious to try it next time I make this challah. Here’s an informative post on the differences between the two flours: https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/cooking-tips-tutorials/a35363978/bread-flour-vs-all-purpose-flour/ Let us know how this recipe works out for you!
Thank you!
I would really appreciate your wisdom/instructions for how to make overnight. When best to refrigerate: before or after first rise? after braiding? Then after refrigeration, if refrigerated before braiding (before or after first rise?) how long before braiding, second rise at room temp? If refrigerated already braided, let sit room temp before baking? Or direct to oven from fridge?
I do appreciate your good cooking! Better Than Honey Cake is yum, too.
Ornice, this is a tough question, and I wouldn’t be confident about answering unless I’ve tried doing this … I’ve never considered refrigerating in any step of the rising process. Maybe Google will have an answer to this? I wish I could be more helpful. Thank you for your kind words! If you try this and it works out, perhaps you can come back and report on the results!