Cinnamon-Apple Twist Bread

Cinnamon-Apple Twist Bread with Egg Wash on top

I’ve baked apples in many forms: in tarts, galettes and pies but have never put them in a loaf of bread. The apple twist bread is ABC’s challenge for October. Skepticism aside, I plunged in and baked the bread. The diversity of apples available in the fall is enticing enough for me to use apples anyway I can. I used Honey Crisp apples for this recipe because I had them in my pantry to be eaten fresh.

I ate a piece of this bread, which I made yesterday, for breakfast. This is a sweet bread, not my usual healthy breakfast item. The sweet tooth in me approved and, well, I had until the end of the day to tackle those extra calories. Then the doorbell rang…. Making a long story short, I offered the cinnamon-apple twist bread to the unexpected guests. They loved it. That made my day!

I made a few changes to the original recipe from King Arthur Flour. That included the usual suspects in making food more wholesome: swapping out a third of the white flour with whole wheat flour, and substituting and reducing granulated white sugar with Demerara raw cane sugar. I also added some pecans to the fillings to impart some textural elements. The glaze in the original recipe was over-the-top in my book ­­­– adding more sweetness to sweet bread. No glaze, but maybe some egg wash for looks. With the test-kitchen's cap on, I experimented with a different approach to see whether I can do away with any kind of glazing entirely. Now a trickier substitution: I used pastry flour instead of pastry blend or all-purpose flour called for in the recipe. I knew what I got myself into by using a lower-gluten flour. My bread would be soft and tender, like pastry, but won't rise as much. For good measure, I sifted all the flours, leaving out the bran in the whole wheat flour.

Cinnamon-Apple Twist Bread - Interior

I shaped the bread dough two ways as suggested in the recipe: a twisted loaf and a bunch of rolls. The issue I encountered was not having enough of the cinnamon, apple and pecan filling at the end.  I slathered a generous amount of the filling on the first piece of dough (which became the twisted loaf) and short-changed the second piece of dough (which became the rolls) with just a thin smear. After the bake, I knew I paid the price of my heavy-handedness with the filling for a less-than-optimum rise of the twisted loaf.

The operating manual of my combi-steam oven recommended baking bread rolls and puff pastry in two stages to get that shiny finish on top. Maximum moisture, low temperature in stage one and low moisture, high temperature in stage two. Sounded like a good idea to test out (for both my bread and the oven). I followed this two-stage recommendation and baked the first tray of rolls without any glaze or egg wash on top. The rolls browned evenly right on cue but where’s the shine? Furthermore, the lower initial oven temperature may have contributed to the lack of oven-spring; hence the lower rising rolls. See the picture below.

I proceeded with the second tray of rolls. No steam, just egg wash (by whisking together one egg yolk and one teaspoon of half-and-half) on top. Instead of using a baking sheet, I placed the rolls inside a muffin pan so that the rolls would rise upward and not sideway. Baked them in a regular oven at 350°F without convection. That yielded some surprisingly handsome rolls that can be grabbed on the go. They make perfect bite-size, easy-to-pack finger food. No filling or glaze sticking to your fingers.

Pecans added to apple filling

Baked in a muffin mold

The twisted loaf was the last to bake. I placed it gingerly on a baking sheet. Brushed the loaf with egg wash prepared earlier. This dough benefitted from a longer than two-hour final rise while waiting for the rolls to finish baking. The loaf spread wide and not tall as I’d like. But it tasted delicious. The sweet and tangy flavor of apples, the crunchiness of pecan and the rich aroma of cinnamon spelled autumn harvest in the air.

Baked with steam in two stages