If you’ve been reading the blog for a while, you know I like to make our bread in my bread machine or by hand using mostly whole wheat flour. I wondered if the bread machine recipe would work to make buns so I used the basic recipe but used the dough hook in my mixer, did the rises, and then used the oven with a pan of water in the bottom to generate steam as described in my post on no knead bread.
Ingredients:
2/3 cup warm water
¾ cup 1% milk
3 TBSP honey
1 TBSP active dry yeast
1 ½ tsp regular salt
1 cup bread flour
1 2/3 cup white whole wheat flour
1 cup regular oats
1 ½ TBSP vital wheat gluten
2 TBSP olive oil, plus more for oiling bowl
Kosher salt for sprinkling
Kosher salt for sprinkling
Method:
Warm the milk to get the chill off (I used the microwave) and combine with water, honey and yeast. Let sit for 5 minutes or so until foamy. Mix flours, salt, oats, and gluten together in bowl of stand mixer (or other bowl if you’re going to do it by hand).
Pour 2 TBSP olive oil over the flour mixture and then with mixer on low, pour in the yeast mixture. Mix on low for 2 minutes and medium for 4 minutes, until dough is formed into a nice elastic ball.
Turn mixer off and touch dough. It shouldn’t feel too tacky-if it is sticking to your fingers, turn mixer back on and add in a tsp at a time of flour. If it feels hard and not tacky at all, turn mixer back on and add a tsp of water at a time until you are happy with the result. The temperature and humidity of your room will affect the final product, so sorry I can’t be more specific.
Place dough in oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Keep in a warm place for 1-2 hours or until the dough has doubled in size.
With oiled hands, divide dough into 8 rounds and place on parchment lined baking sheet.
Cover with plastic wrap and return to warm place for another 1-2 hour rise or until doubled in size.
Cover with plastic wrap and return to warm place for another 1-2 hour rise or until doubled in size.
While dough finishes rising, place broiler pan in bottom of oven and preheat oven to 400 degrees. Brush tops of buns with water and sprinkle with salt.
Place pan with buns on middle rack and quickly put a cup of water in broiler pan and close door. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until browned.
These were good, but I prefer this recipe for sandwich bread which I can slice thinly, over the buns which I found a bit too much bread for me. I guess I could make them smaller! Anyway, not a bad recipe, but I think I’ll keep working on the perfect bun recipe.
Do you have THE perfect bun recipe?
