Sweet Cinnamon Bread Star

TURKISH BREAD STAR WITH POWDERED SUGAR AND BROWN SUGAR CINNAMON

I’m a little late to the bread star game, but honestly my king cake recipe is pretty close since technically it’s a bread! In fact, I used my dough recipe for this exact star.

If you don’t want extra powdered sugar sprinkled on top, leave it be!

It may seem intimidating with the looks of it at first glance, but it’s not as hard as you think. In fact, the dough proofing takes the longest, and you just need to do some layering, cutting and twisting after that. Easy right? Below are the steps, not ALL of the steps, but most of them to get the idea of how to make this delicious star.

TURKISH BREAD STAR WITH POWDERED SUGAR AND BROWN SUGAR CINNAMON RECIPE

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cup 2% milk

• 1/4 cup butter

• 1/4 cup sugar

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 1 large egg

• 2 active yeast packets

• 4 1/2 cup AP flour

• melted butter for each layer when building star

• powdered sugar and/or sprinkles for dusting on bread after baked

• filling per layer: 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 cup chopped pecans, generous drizzle of honey covering the layer

• egg wash for formed star before baking

Instructions

Microwave milk for 1 min 40 sec.

Add butter, sugar, salt, stirring to melt butter.

Add beaten egg.

Stir in yeast packets.

Pour wet ingredients into mixer, then slowly add AP flour to the mixer until dough is balled on bread hook. Let it knead itself for 5 minutes in the stand mixer bowl.

Collect the sticky dough onto a cutting board and knead for a few more minutes. Tuck itself into a ball, and place in a buttered or oiled bowl/container to proof in a draftless area of the kitchen for an hour.

Set oven to 375°F.

Once the hour is up, punch down the risen dough once of twice, pulling out the dough to roll in a bit of flour.

Roll into a heaping large disc, and then use a bread cutter to cut into 4 pieces.

With the rolling pin, roll out each disc, one by one, to a 10” circle, about 1/4 inch thick.

Place the first disc on a pizza oven baking tray, with a piece of parchment covering it.

As the picture suggests in the grid above, put one layer down, and spread each filling ingredient starting with a brush of butter, cinnamon, brown sugar, pecans and drizzle of honey.

Do this with the next 2 layers, and then top with the fourth layer.

You will need to use a 10” (or a 9” circular baking dish) disc or whatever you have to trim off the edges. I only have a 9” collapsable cheesecake dish bottom, so I used that and estimated the trim. Trim the wonky edges.

Get a 4” glass and lightly indent it in the center like above picture. You will use this to cut your 16 lines.

Start with 4 cuts from top, bottom and sides, then keep going in half for each cut until you get to 16.

Take 2 pieces that are next to each other, and turn counter clockwise, about 3-4 times, depending on what you can get away with, and then pinch together to form a star end. Do this with the remaining 7 pairs.

Dabble with egg wash, and if you want, like I did, put a cut out of the left over dough on the center of the star.

Place the now egg washed star on the pizza baking tray in the oven, and bake for 17 minutes.

Once golden brown, remove and sprinkle with powdered sugar and/or sprinkles.

Have a happy new year!