Olive Oil Brioche des Rois for Epiphany

Hello, and welcome to Newsletter No 12 here on Substack! Thank you for stopping by. Grab a seat if you are interested in recipes as well as tips and tricks to make the most of our increasingly eclectic pantries - and make sure you hit that subscribe button if you don’t want to miss any future posts!

I am quite partial to a good seasonal bake. Even more so if it’s something I did not grow up eating. Rather predictably, when I first moved to Belgium, I fell in love with the almond frangipane puff pastry encased Galettes des Rois. Commonly eaten for Epiphany, these days you can find Galettes des Rois throughout the month of January in bakeries across Belgium and France (and increasingly elsewhere too). 

Yet, and this might be controversial, as tasty as Galettes des Rois are, all things considered they are actually not all that exciting. In some ways, a Galette des Rois is really just a less sugary almond croissant in disguise. There are no doubt many ways of making Galettes des Rois more interesting (albeit less traditional) - e.g. maybe using a mahlab-flavoured and sour cherry studded frangipane filling, or maybe a salted brown butter and cardamom frangipane (or the fig leaf one from Khobz bakery in Brussels I mentioned yesterday)? But I digress. 

Once I discovered Galette des Rois, I also learned that many countries have pastries, cakes and breads specifically eaten to celebrate Epiphany (if any parts of Germany do, please let me know, but it certainly wasn’t part of my upbringing). In the South of France they eat a so-called Brioche des Rois (a close relative of the Roscon de Reyes eaten across the border in Spain) for Epiphany. 

Also known as Gateau des Rois, a Brioche des Rois is an orange blossom water and orange zest scented round-shaped brioche with a hole in the centre. Typically adorned with pearl sugar and candied fruit, they are meant to resemble a crown and do look rather festive. I adore orange blossom water flavoured anything and everything but what I enjoy even more about Brioche des Rois is the fact that, the further South you travel in France, the more likely you are to find Brioche des Rois made with olive oil rather than butter. And if you were already a reader of my old blog, you know how much I adore olive oil in brioche - somehow, a brioche made with olive oil allows the flavour of the other ingredients (in this case the orange blossom water and orange zest) to really shine. Plus, you end up with a beautifully soft and fluffy crumb that stays moist for days.

If this first and hopefully still slow week of January has you looking for your next baking experiment, then look no further! Below I share my tried and tested recipe for Brioche des Rois. And if you fancy serving your Brioche des Rois as something a little special at your first brunch of 2024, then I can strongly recommend cutting your Brioche des Rois in half horizontally and filling it with lightly sweetened whipped Mascarpone (my go to ratio is 2 parts Mascarpone to 3 parts cream) and maybe some candied kumquats.

Before we get to the recipe, just a few words on what you can expect to find in my Newsletter in 2024. In short, I hope more of the same. Starting this newsletter as a sequel to my old blog just as I was slowly leaving the newborn sleepless nights and resulting brain fog behind was one of my best decisions last year. I hugely enjoy writing this newsletter and I get a kick every time somebody tells me they are reading and baking along! So yes, expect to see a new edition of this newsletter in your inboxes about once a week, typically on a Sunday but earlier in cases like today where I want to share a recipe early enough to allow you to bake something for an upcoming special occasion. And just as last year, there will be a mix of recipe posts and other musings about food. 

I generally share recipes for what I like to eat myself (and would love to see in cafes and bakeries near me). But let me know if you have any quandaries I could help with - any ingredients languishing in your pantry or your spice cupboard and that you need ideas for and I will try and come up with something delicious. 

Brioche des Rois

Ingredients

350g all purpose flour

1.5 tsp dried active yeast

125ml milk 

1 tbsp orange blossom water

Zest of 1 orange

1 egg

50g sugar

Pinch of salt

75ml olive oil

1 egg to egg wash

Handful of pearl sugar, candied citrus fruit to decorate 

Directions

The night before you want to bake your brioche, mix 50g of the flour with 50ml of the milk and a pinch of the yeast. Cover and set aside overnight to create an overnight poolish (essentially a non-sourdough starter or pre-ferment for your brioche dough).  

In the morning, add the remaining flour, yeast, milk, orange blossom water, orange zest, egg, sugar, salt and your overnight poolish to the bowl of your standmixer. Knead for 5-10 minutes on low until the dough is starting to come together in a smooth mass (the dough will look impossibly dry at first but that will disappear after a few minutes of kneading). While continuing to knead on low, slowly drizzle in the olive oil. Once all the olive oil has been absorbed by the dough, turn up the speed to high and knead for a further 5-10 minutes or until the dough passes the window pane test (i.e. you can stretch a small piece of dough far enough between your fingers that it becomes translucent). Cover and set aside to proof somewhere warm for 1.5-2 hours or until the dough has doubled in size.

Punch the dough down to degas and briefly knead with your hands. 

Pre-heat the oven to 180 C and line a sheetpan with parchment paper.

On a lightly floured surface shape the dough into a round. Then, using your thumbs, press a hole into the centre of your dough. Carefully stretch the dough until you have a circle ca. 20cm in diameter by rotating the dough with both of your thumbs in the hole in the centre of the dough while simultaneously using your hands to gently stretch the dough. Place the dough on the parchment-lined sheetpan, cover with a tea towel and set aside somewhere warm to proof for 1.5-2hrs or until the dough has doubled in size.

Carefully brush the brioche all over with the eggwash. Scatter some pearl sugar all over the brioche and press some candied citrus into the dough.

Bake for ca. 25-30 Minutes or until the brioche is golden in colour and sounds hollow when tapped from underneath. Leave to cool on the sheetpan for 5 minutes before carefully moving to a cooling rack to cool down completely. 

Best eaten on the day they are made, a Brioche des Rois will keep for a few days, just make sure you wrap it well. Once stale (assuming it even lasts that long!), Brioche des Rois still makes for fantastic French Toast, Bread and Butter Pudding and no doubt Bostock as well.