Challah can be made in all sorts of ways. But it is traditionally used for Shabbat dinner (Friday night; or other holidays) and that dinner usually contains meat (for many families who couldn’t afford to eat meat regularly, they would try to have some for Shabbat). Kosher rules of course prohibit eating dairy and meat in the same meal.

If your bakery was selling challah to people who weren’t Jewish, or were but didn’t keep kosher, or who were vegetarian, or who wanted the challah for purposes other than having it at dinner, etc, then the butter wouldn’t be an issue (for those who otherwise ate dairy that is). Challah is delicious (makes great french toast too) so lots of people buy it for non-ritual purposes.

So, yeah, if you look at Jewish cookbooks, all the challah recipes will be nondairy. Unless there is a special “brunch” version or something. Or it’s a vegetarian Jewish cookbook. Gosh I have a lot of exceptions in this comment

Cyndi

If you can eat eggs (or you’re willing to make it with eggs for your BIL), you’ll get a lot more of the challah texture. My daughter’s super allergic to eggs so I haven’t tried the mix that way, so I can’t tell you how much of a difference it will actually make. The Pamela’s mix makes really good bread. It’s just not *egg* bread. You’d want to up the eggs for the mix, not just use the basic amount, but I just don’t know how much or if you have to tweak it in other ways.

Challah of course is traditionally dairy-free. There must be some GF recipes out there. I was going to suggest you do a search except, duh, that’s how you found me.

If you have success, please post about it!

Cyndi

The “Masa” one might not work, but this first one might. (He isn’t sensitive to tapioca.) Now to find that bread mix….

But you said it “really didn’t taste like challah.” Have you discovered any way to make it more “challah-y”?

Thanks for your postings. Any thoughts would be appreciated!