Pecan Free Bread Machine Brioche
Rich, buttery, and impossibly tender, this brioche is the kind of bread that makes you feel like a serious baker the moment it comes out of the oven. The bread machine does the heavy lifting on kneading, which is genuinely the trickiest part of brioche — getting all that butter fully incorporated into a smooth, supple dough takes time and patience, and the machine handles it beautifully. The dough gets a slow, steady first rise right inside the machine before you shape it into three equal balls and nestle them into a loaf pan for a second proof, building that gorgeous domed crown. A simple egg yolk and milk wash before baking gives the finished loaf its deep chestnut color and that bakery-worthy sheen. Every ingredient here is straightforward — milk, eggs, butter, flour, sugar, salt, and yeast — so there's no need to scan labels or worry about unexpected add-ins that can sneak into store-bought enriched breads. Slice it thick while it's still just barely warm, or let it cool completely so the crumb sets into those soft, pillowy layers that make brioche so irresistible for everything from French toast to a simple smear of jam.
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Learn more →Ingredients
12 servings
For the dough
- ¼ cup whole milk, warmed to 95–100°f (35–38°c)
- 3 large eggs, room temperature
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp fine sea salt
- 3 cups bread flour
- 2 ¼ tsp active dry yeast (1 standard packet)
- 10 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch cubes, softened
For the egg wash
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 tbsp whole milk
Instructions
- 1
Add the ingredients to the bread machine pan in the order your machine's manual specifies (typically liquids first, then dry ingredients, with yeast last and kept away from the salt). Add the warmed milk, then the 3 eggs, sugar, and salt. Add the bread flour on top, then make a small well in the center of the flour and add the yeast.
- 2
Select the Dough cycle on your bread machine and start it. Once the machine has been kneading for about 5 minutes and a shaggy dough has formed, begin adding the softened butter cubes a few at a time through the lid opening, waiting about 30 seconds between additions. The dough will look rough and greasy at first — continue until all the butter is incorporated and the dough is smooth, supple, and pulls away cleanly from the sides of the pan, about 10–12 minutes into the knead cycle.
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