Preparation
Christmas bread has a lot of different interpretations. The most traditional iterations involve sugar and spice, and often—but not always—yeast, and ultimately have strong cultural associations and country ties. Consider German stollen, Greek Christopsomo, Italian panettone, and Mexican three kings bread (and its French pastry-equivalent galette des rois).
One thing we can all agree on is that Christmas bread is celebratory, whether or not we observe the holiday. In the spirit of seasonal cravings (as well as good will and sharing!), we gathered our best breads to bake at Christmas, ranging from iconic recipes to festive tear-and-shares—with a flurry of quicker loaves that use baking powder when you don’t have time to watch the (yeasted) buns rise for good measure.
