Swedish Braided Bread
By: Anonymous
Published: Wednesday, December 2, 2009 - 11:59pm

Ingredients




1/2 cup melted butter
2/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 1/4 cups hot milk
1 pkg. dry yeast
1 egg, well beaten
1 teaspoon almond extract
7 cups white flour

Preparation

1 Mix the butter, sugar, salt, and hot milk in large bowl and let cool to lukewarm. Stir the yeast into 1/4 cup warm water and let stand for 5 minutes to dissolve. Add dissolved yeast, egg, almond extract, and 3 cups flour and mix vigorously. Add 3 more cups flour and mix well. Turn out onto a lightly floured board, knead for a minute or two, and let rise for 10 minutes. 2 Add the remaining flour only if dough is too sticky. Resume kneading until smooth and elastic. Put dough in a large, buttered bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until double in bulk. Punch it down, knead it for a minute or two and divide it into 6 equal pieces. Stretch and roll each piece with your hand until you have 6 long rolls of uniform size. 3 Make 2 braids, pinching the 3 pieces of dough firmly together at the ends. Place them on buttered cookie sheets, cover, and let rise to about double in bulk. Brush with 1 egg yolk, lightly beaten with 1 teaspoon cold water. Bake at 375 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes. 4 OPTIONAL: Sprinkle, before baking, with blanched, chopped almonds.