Let Me Eat Brioche

If I can prepare something cheaper and better I make; if it can be had quickly for a value, I will purchase it. Bread, and there is so much good bread in Portland, is almost always purchased, 2 bucks gets an outstanding loaf without the kneading, flour, salt, water, yeast, electricity, proofing/waiting and baking – even if it entails making a special trip to get a favorite loaf, purchasing bread is a deal I willfully make.

The exception is brioche, the cakey butter and egg bread that Marie Antoinette referenced when she rather tone-deafly told a hungry Parisian population, “Qu’ils mangent de al brioche”, or as English speakers spitefully translate, ‘let them eat cake’. I heed Mademoiselle Antoinette’s advice, eating brioche about 6-8 times a year.

Brioche is difficult loaf. Not from a technical perspective, few things in the kitchen really are difficult in that sense – it isn’t brain surgery/rocket science depending which way you want to go with that - but there are kitchen projects that take time, experience and a level of expertise.

The word comes to our language from the Old Norman, brier, meaning to pound or alternatively the brioche evolved from the French bray/broyer – a term meaning to break up; either etymology references the prolonged mixing and kneading the dough requires. Although it takes time and attention, the dough does make a very satisfying rhythmic slapping sound as it comes together in the mixer; someone should sample that beat, it would be the beat to the coolest hip-hop-bread song ever. While most loafs rise twice, brioche requires a rare triple rise, the final rise takes 4-6 hours or can stretch to overnight in a refrigerator. Making the dough an up early in the morning in order to be ready for dinner or a more stately paced 2-day project.

The dough is rich, I use (and recommend the use of) the Nancy Silverton/Dorie Greenspan/Julia Child recipe from Baking with Julia, the one that calls for 5 eggs and a stick and a half of butter: Good on its own, it is better married to other flavors. Brioche Vendeenne is flavored with brandy: Marzipan, saffron, anise, sausage, are common ingredients for the bread, this short list hints the there is no flavor too strong for the dough. Here in the Saucykitchen, sweet brioche is filled with cream cheese and jam -lately a gingery rhubarb jam. Savory brioche is stuffed with goat’s milk cheese & ham, sautéed mushrooms, sweet peas & caramelized onions, asparagus tips & brie or salami, roasted (dried, devoid of most moisture) tomatoes and a little basil.

I give them to coworkers and neighbors, who enthusiastically claim they would pay for them. I believe they see me as someone akin to our zipcode’s tamale man, who goes door-to-door selling his treats, instead I could busking little breads. All in all, a nice little dreamy cash in pocket venture that promises a better ROI than an Amway distributorship. It sounds doable until a calculator is applied to the fantasy: Those little 3-inch brioche would have to get sold 3 for $10 and that wouldn’t really be a killer margin or really even a satisfying lunch, with that kind of pricing it is no wonder people bake the bread themselves.