A Chinese-flavoured challah tells a timeless human story

On a friday afternoon, in the Platonic ideal of an Ashkenazi Jewish kitchen, a chicken roasts in the oven as a challah bakes beside it. Technically, challah refers to any bread that has been ritually sanctified, but most people know it as a sweet, leavened, egg-enriched braided loaf. It is a cousin to brioche, but because it is often served with meat, it eschews the French version’s butter (Jewish dietary law forbids the consumption of milk and meat at the same meal). The result is better for the omission, lighter and cleaner-tasting.

Challah differs from baker to baker, but even so, Molly Yeh’s is unusual. Ms Yeh, a cookery writer and television presenter, is Jewish and Chinese. So is her challah. After the dough rises, it gets divided into three logs, which are flattened, brushed with sesame oil and sprinkled with spring onions, salt, chilli flakes and pepper, before being rolled up and braided. The flavours come from cong you bing, an unleavened fried Chinese bread, known in the West as a scallion pancake.