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Golden Santa Bread Recipe

Golden Santa Bread Recipe photo by Taste of Home

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A friend of mine shared this fun idea. She made it with purchased frozen dough, and I use a family bread recipe. The finished loaf looks complicated. but it's actually simple to create. —Vicki Melies, Elkhorn, Nebraska

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Golden Santa Bread Recipe

Prep: 30 min. + rising Bake: 25 min. + cooling

Yield: 16-18 Servings

30 25 55

Ingredients

4 to 4-1/2 cups bread flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 packages (1/4 ounce each) active dry yeast
1-1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup butter, cubed
2 eggs
2 raisins
2 egg yolks
2 to 3 drops red food coloring

Directions

In a large bowl, combine 2 cups flour, sugar, yeast and salt. In a small saucepan, heat the milk, water and butter to 120°-130°. Add to dry ingredients; beat just until moistened. Beat in the eggs until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to form a stiff dough.
Turn onto a floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, about 6-8 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, turning once to grease top. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1 hour.
Punch dough down. Turn onto a lightly floured surface; divide into two portions, one slightly larger than the other.
Shape the larger portion into an elongated triangle with rounded corners for Santa's head and hat.
Divide the smaller portion in half. Shape and flatten one half into a beard. Using scissors or a pizza cutter, cut into strips to within 1 in. of top. Position on Santa's face; twist and curl strips if desired.
Use the remaining dough for the mustache, nose, hat pom-pom and brim. Shape a portion of dough into a mustache; flatten and cut the ends into small strips with scissors. Place above beard. Place a small ball above mustache for nose. Fold tip of hat over and add another ball for pom-pom. Roll out a narrow piece of dough to create a hat brim; position under hat.
With a scissors, cut two slits for eyes; insert raisins into slits. In separate small bowls, beat egg each yolk. Add red food coloring to one yolk; carefully brush over hat, nose and cheeks. Brush plain yolk over remaining dough.
Cover loosely with foil. Bake at 350° for 15 minutes. Uncover; bake 10-12 minutes longer or until golden brown. Cool on a wire rack. Yield: 1 loaf.

How-To: Instructions for making Golden Santa Bread >

Originally published as Golden Santa Bread in Country Woman Christmas Annual 2007, p73

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Reviews for Golden Santa Bread

Golden Santa Bread

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(1-10) of 38 reviews

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Reviewed on Dec. 23, 2012 by 0momma3

I have made this twice and the bread will not rise! I will different recipe to make bread im sad that this didnt work out:(

Reviewed on Dec. 19, 2012 by mandt2

This was cute and fairly easy to make, but I would not use the bread recipe listed again. It had too much sugar, which impacted both the taste and the length of time for the bread to rise. Allrecipes has a good Amish Bread recipe that would work well with this and could easily make 2 santas. I didn't have dark raisins, so used halved green candied cherries for the eyes. Another reviewer also summed other critical information very well: when you tent it with foil, it will stick and ruin the appearance of the nose, unless you put a couple of crumpled up foil balls beside the bread to elevate the foil enough to prevent it from touching the dough. Also, it is good to brush the entire santa with the plain egg wash, then go back and add the red wash to the cheeks, etc. I also found this needed to bake about 20 minutes longer than indicated, although flattening the triangle used for the face/hat may help that.

Reviewed on Dec. 09, 2012 by Athanasius' Mommy

I thought it has a sweet flavor to it.

Reviewed on Dec. 09, 2012 by a.hinkle

is this a regular bread, or is it sweet?

Reviewed on Dec. 09, 2012 by jsturm6610

I made this Santa Bread last X-mas and am going to make it again. It looks like you spend so much time on it and it is so easy to make. I used the frozen bread dough.

Reviewed on Dec. 09, 2012 by jsturm6610

I made this Santa Bread last X-mas and am going to make it again. It looks like you spend so much time on it and it is so easy to make. I used the frozen bread dough.

Reviewed on Dec. 08, 2012 by Dinsky

This is amazing! Every Santa gets better (as your skill improves) than the last. One question though - has anyone tried freezing a ready made Santa bread?? I would like to give several loaves away for Christmas gifts so if I can't freeze them I would have to get up around 2:00a.m to get them all made (not gonna happen).

Reviewed on Jan. 07, 2012 by veraann

This turned out really cute,grand-kids loved it. I use a potato bread recipe (that I really like) so I couldn't rate at five stars.

Reviewed on Jan. 01, 2012 by shelbybird

This bread is AMAZING! I cut corners and used frozen dough, but still, it came out amazing!

TIPS: 1) I wouldn't recommend serving this alone... I served it alongside a dish of Cinnamon Honey Butter that another user recommended.

The Recipe: 1c Honey, 1c Butter (2 sticks), 1c Powdered Sugar, 2tsp Cinnamon. Whisk using the whisk attachment on your mixer.

2) Definitely do a practice run beforehand if you're going to be taking this somewhere or giving it as a gift.

3) Santa bread and a jar of homemade cinnamon honey butter make an EXCELLENT Christmas gift! :)

Reviewed on Dec. 29, 2011 by Athanasius' Mommy

UPDATE: I made this dough recipe a second time. Instead of making it into a Santa face, I separated the dough into three strands and braided them. I then brushed one of the strands with egg white, a second strand with red food coloring (egg yolk w/3 red drops), and the third strand with green food coloring (egg yolk w/3 green drops). It turned out WONDERFUL! Better reviews this time...perhaps because I didn't handle the dough as much. It was more moist this go-around. This is such a GREAT dough recipe...one person said it reminded them of sourdough. You can fashion the dough into whatever design you want!!

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