Bread in a Bag Recipe + How to Braid Challah

Bread in a Bag {Foolproof Recipe!!!}

I know what you are thinking – making bread dough is hard! You need a very specific temperature and environment in your home, or else it won’t rise and will turn out dense and end up like a heavy brick in the trash. Have no fear, this is an absolutely foolproof recipe for how to make bread in a bag. Your kids can do this on their own (though depending on their age, you may need to help them with the oven.) Your house will smell positively divine, you will have freshly baked challah bread and your kids will be fascinated by watching their dough!

Cooking Classes for Kids

We are having so much fun doing cooking classes for kids this week! Don’t forget to check out our shopping list for all of the items you will need for our virtual cooking classes for kids. Also, join our Facebook group to see our live classes and follow us on Pinterest, so you won’t miss a thing! You definitely need to follow Hannah at Inspired Sparks too, because in a little bit, she will post an awesome video to teach kids how to make this bread in a bag recipe! Here are the links for the other cooking classes we have done thus far, in case you missed any:

• Tortilla Pizza (SUCH a staple in our house!)
• Brigadeiros (Brazillian Fudge Balls)
• How to Make Edible Slime (including a pb & slime sandwich for lunch!)

Challah Bread in a Bag Ingredients

Gather the following ingredients from your kitchen!

• 1 Ziploc bag (gallon size)
• 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 TB white sugar
• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 1 TB active dry yeast
• 1/2 TB salt
• 1 egg
• 1 cup warm water
• OPTIONAL add-ins: sesame seeds, everything but the bagel seasoning, chocolate chips and cinnamon sugar are some of our favorites!

Bread in a Bag Recipe

Here are the simple steps for making the challah bread dough in a bag!

1. Put these ingredients into your Ziploc bag

Add the following ingredients into your Ziploc bag in this order:

• 1 cup warm water
• 1 TB active dry yeast
• 1/2 TB salt
• 3 TB white sugar
• 1/3 cup canola oil
• 3 cups all-purpose flour (we are saving the other 1/4 cup for later)

If you want to make chocolate chip or raisin challah, you can add those to the bag now too! Otherwise, it will be hard to get these ingredients to incorporate into your dough later on.

2. Knead the ingredients in the bag

Use your hands and fingers to knead / mix the ingredients together. It does not have to be perfect, but you want to get the dough started a little bit.

3. Put your Ziploc bag in a large bowl of warm water for half an hour

Fill up a large bowl with warm water. When we say warm, we mean a comfortably warm temperature (not boiling hot and not cold.) But don’t overthink this too much or let this intimidate you!

4. Open the bag, shake & put it on the counter

After 30 minutes of sitting in the bowl of warm water, open the bag up to release air from your bag. Then, shake the bag up a tiny bit and put it on your counter for another hour. Have your kids flip the bag every 20 minutes. Don’t worry if the dough is super wet – that is a good thing! You will also notice lots of bubbles forming, which is also a positive sign that the science behind bread making (the yeast) is working!

5. Add 1/4 cup of flour & let it rise for 1.5 hours

Add 1/4 cup of flour to your bread in a bag, and knead it a little bit through the bag again. Then, let your dough rise for another 1.5 hours. Again, don’t worry if the dough looks super wet! If your bread in a bag is not rising, flip the bag over and punch it down.

Your bag will end up completely full of air. Hannah thought it was so cool how you couldn’t even press down on the bag, because it was super inflated!

6. Braid your challah (full instructions below!)

There are tons of ways to braid a challah, but I have outlined the two most popular braids down below! Hannah opted to do a 4-strand braid, as you can see below.

She is only 8 years old, and I am beyond impressed by how perfectly she did the 4-stranded braid. This was her first time doing it on her own!!!

7. Use a silicone brush to paint an egg wash on your challah

There are lots of different opinions on the egg wash! You can use the whole egg or just the yolk. Some people (like me!) mix a little bit of sugar into the egg wash first too. Experiment to see what you like best! We prefer a mixture of egg yolk with sugar, because it makes the most beautifully deep, shiny color!

8. Add your toppings (optional)

Now is the time to add things like sesame seeds or cinnamon sugar to the top. We opted for everything but the bagel seasoning as our topping. It is always a HUGE hit in our house!

9. Preheat your oven to 300 degrees Farenheit

We are almost ready to bake our challah bread, so preheat your oven to 300 degrees!

10. Let it rise for 15 more minutes on a non-stick baking sheet

Just one more quick rise before we are ready to bake our bread in a bag recipe!

11. Bake your challah bread for 40 minutes

Your challah should be golden on top when it is done. Another way to check if your challah is fully cooked is to pick it up and knock on the bottom… it should sound hollow if it is done. Be careful not to burn yourself though (kids, ask an adult for help!)

OMG!!! Look at that gorgeous challah made ENTIRELY by an eight year old!!! I mean, checkout the closeup of how golden and shiny the crust on top turned out…

How is the inside, you ask? Light, airy and absolutely delicious!!!

But actually, this face is why you should teach your kids how to cook and bake. The self-esteem boost, the sense of pride in her work and the smile across her face when she took her first bite and said, “WOW! I really did it!!”… that, my friends, is why we do this!

How to Braid Challah

Since we are making challah bread in a bag, it is traditionally braided. There are many different ways to braid challah! You can do a 3-stranded braid, a 4-stranded braid, or even a 5, 6, 7 or 8 stranded braid!!! The most common though are 3 or 4 stranded braids.

How to braid a 3-stranded challah

You braid a 3-stranded challah the same way that you braid hair or a bracelet… right over middle, left over middle and repeat. Easy peasy and will bring you back to your days of summer camp!

How to braid a 4-stranded challah

Want to impress everyone by your gorgeous challah braiding skills? A 4-stranded challah is actually really easy and the results are beautiful. To make it easier to see what strand is going where, I am going to show you how to do it below using 4 different colored pipe cleaners. While you are waiting for your dough to rise, give your kids string or pipe cleaners and let them practice! The pipe cleaner braid turned into a bracelet for one of my kids, and she thinks it is just the coolest thing!

1. Split your dough into 4 balls and stretch / roll them into equally long strands.

2. Connect your four strands together at the top and organize them to look like the photo below

3. Move your top right strand all the way to the top left, and your top left strand all the way to the top right

4. Take your leftmost strand and move it to the middle

5. Now, move the middle strand to the top left (to replace the strand you moved in step #4)

6. Repeat steps 4 and 5, but with the strand in the upper right hand side

7. Keep repeating steps 4 & 5, alternating the right and left sides, until your challah is fully braided

8. Then flatten both ends out a little bit & tuck them under

What Bread in a Bag Are You Making?

Which bread in a bag are you going to make? Cinnamon raisin? Chocolate chip? Sesame seed? Plain? Be sure to let us know how it turns out too, by posting a photo of your challah in our Facebook Group, and don’t forget to follow us on Pinterest and Hannah at Inspired Sparks (she will have a challah bread in a bag video up shortly!)