Prosphora recipe 2 (Mat. Galina's)

 Here is the recipe for one prosphora loaf in the pan that works for our oven. All ingredients are organic.

The steps are simplified for saving time and muscles, LOL

4 cups of King’s Arthur flour, not sieved

1 tsp of sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp of Red Star baking yeast 

1 1/2 cup of pleasantly hot water

Mix all dry ingredients in the Viking mixing bowl with spatula. Turn the mixer on STIR, add water—not all at once, but also not too slow. Let it mix until the ball if formed. Cover and let it rise for about an hour. 

The next steps are done by eyeing. 1/4 of dough rolled in a flat circle of the approximate diameter of a pan, put into the pan sprinkled with flour, pressed and patted with wide silicone turner spatula.

 The leftover dough also rolled into slightly bigger circle than the pan. Moist the first circle with wet paper towel, and drop the second one on it. Again use the spatula to press down and pat the dough pie, especially in the center. Make many holes (deep but not all the way through) with a bamboo stick. Any design of holes and prayers during the baking process are welcome. Cover it with a piece of aluminum foil and let it rise for about 30 min until the dough is even with the pan edge. Uncover and bake in the preheated oven at 350 for 1 hour.

The color of the loaf should be light-golden. Drop it out of the pan and cool down on the towel, turning a couple of times. God bless your efforts! 

Prosphora recipe 1 (Susan's)

When I first started baking Prosphora using the Gifted Pan, I tried the recipe that came with it. It did not turn out well for me or look anything like their picture. 

I struggled to get a good impression, to avoid big cracks, to avoid holes in the loaf, and to keep the loaf from getting too brown.

I played around with the recipe in a lot of ways, and finally landed on the following. 

I don't know if every thing I did was technically necessary, since I got tired of experimenting and didn't want to risk spending the time to bake and not have usable loaves.

See Matushka Galina's recipe for a much simpler starting point! Then, if you need to tweak your technique, see my more complicated process below for ideas. 

NOTE: I baked two loaves at a time, so the proportions will need to be adjusted for one loaf. I tried to have a pretty stiff dough, in order to have a dense crumb and take the impression well.

INGREDIENTS

8 cups of King Arthur All Purpose flour (measured by sprinkling into the measuring cup, not packing it. I use a scale and weigh out 34.5 ounces.) I usually get Organic.

1 tsp salt

2 heaping teaspoons instant yeast (I use "saf-instant", sold by King Arthur's store, but may be at the coops, too)

2 and about 1/4 cups water, warm

DIRECTIONS

In my KitchenAid mixer with the dough hook, I put the dry ingredients in and mix on speed level 2 while I prepare the water. 

(Note: KitchenAid recommends speed level 2 for bread dough. If you have a different type of mixer, use what they say. It's a stiff dough, so you don't want to try to run the mixer too fast - will overly stress the machine!)

I set a timer for 10 minutes, then start slowly drizzling the water in while praying. It usually takes 2-3 minutes to pour the water in and get it incorporated into the flour. As soon as it is, I stop the mixer and feel the dough. Should be one big lump, fairly firm to the touch but not too hard. Definitely not very soft and sticky. Add a bit of water or flour if needed. Then continue kneading with the machine for the remainder of the 10 minutes.

Take the bowl off of the mixer and cover with plastic wrap (so the top doesn't dry out) and let rise for 30 minutes.

Take the dough out and fold/knead it into a rectangle shape. Cover the dough with the plastic wrap and a kitchen towel, let rest for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, turn the oven on and set to 275 degrees. After about 5-7 minutes, put the pans in the oven to warm up.

Cut the top third of the dough off, then each of the resulting pieces in half. You'll have two smaller chunks and two bigger chunks. (Remember, this is for 2 loaves.)

Put 3 of the chunks to the side, covered with a towel. Shape the other one into a ball, then roll into a circle on a lightly floured surface. Put each circle back under the towel while rolling the next lump. Roll the little pieces to about 8", and the big pieces to about 9".

If I see any air bubbles while rolling, I pop them with a cake tester or toothpick.

Take the pan(s) out of the oven. Press the thinner/smaller circles into the bottom of the pan (the nicer-looking side should go face down into the pan), pressing firmly with your palm/fingers so the dough settles into the imprint. Moisten the top of the dough (I just used a wet folded-up paper towel) then place the larger circle on top. Press gently.

Bake at 275 for 15 minutes, then increase temperature to 300 for 45 minutes. (I did this to avoid a quick rise in the oven, to try to minimize cracking.)

Remove from oven and turn loaf out onto cooling rack. Cover with towel and let cool most of the way before bagging. I put them in a freezer-grade Ziplock and store them in the freezer.

Note - I never wash the pan. Mat. Katie Dellermann had trouble with the coating flaking off of her pan, and she thinks it's because she washed it. If flour or anything seems to build up on the imprint, I just brush it out.