The Fresh Loaf

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GERMAN BROTCHEN

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

GERMAN BROTCHEN

 

GERMAN BROTCHEN

The German brotchen is a hot milk bread that kneads together yielding a smoothly elastic dough. This makes great rolls and buns. The best is to eat it warm with your favorite cheese or jam. I have searched online for other brotchen recipes. An internet search did not turn up a brotchen recipe for awhile but now several are available. However, none are identical to the one I got on that wonderful trip to Germany in the 80’s from a nice German lady.  The US Army officer husband helped convert metric measures to English.  This has to be the best travel souvenir I have ever returned home with!
Here I share my recipe for you to enjoy: 
GERMAN BROTCHEN

Mix first three ingredients. 
1/2 c. warm water
1 1/2 cup warm milk
1 Tbsp yeast
Add: 3/4 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
When well blended
Add 1 cup flour 
Beat this with a wooden spoon until bubbles appear in the pancake like batter.
Add more flour a cup at a time to make a dough you can no longer stir.
(This recipe uses about 4 cups of flour total; today I used 34 ounces weighed on a scale because I live in South Florida where the air is HEAVY and measuring by volume doesn't work.)
Knead for 10 minutes adding as little flour as possible until the dough is satiny and not sticky. The dough should be firm, and give to the touch. Place in a lightly oiled bowl to rise for 45 minutes (depending on the temp and humidity.  I lived in Wichita and found it a dryer climate yielding shorter proofing times for my breads.) The dough should more than double in size. Degas and remove the dough from bowl onto a floured surface. Knead 4 or 5 times and divide into 10 pieces for large burger size buns or 16 for buns. Sprinkle baking sheet with cornmeal generously and evenly space rolls. Allow to rise again (about 30 minutes) covered with plastic wrap you have brushed lightly with oil. Preheat oven to 350 degree F. When the oven is to temperature place rolls into bake for 20 - 30 minutes or until lightly golden. (I do not score the buns because the ones I had in Germany had a smooth top)  I do splash 1/8 cup water into my gas convection oven three times in 20 second intervals to create my crust at the beginning of the bake time.  Remove to cooling rack.

brotchen

I was unsuccessful in getting rid of the blank box. 

Enjoy! 

Lisa


Comments

Franko's picture
Franko

Thank you Lisa, I've been looking around for this recipe as well. My wife and I will be over in Germany and Austria next summer about this time so I've been focusing on making breads and rolls from that region lately. I'd like to become as familiar with what they bake and eat daily as I can over the next year. Thanks again for posting the recipes and photos. The brotchen look great!

Franko

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

When you make this recipe,  note the salt is on the lighter side.  It makes a wonderful dough that rises beautifully.  More flour yields a denser bun.

You will find the mix and knead that you like.  I will be interested in how it fairs with the real thing of your journey.

I have played with the crust with an egg wash which gives a bit more crunch.  This is not a hard crust like a french bread though.

While in Germany, we stayed in a dairy farm.  This was the breakfast bun, served with fresh home churned butter, fruit jams and cheeses.  the best was the liver pate....  more of a cheese spread.

What other regional breads are you making?  Thanks for your response.  I enjoy hearing what other bakers are taking on as projects.

Guten Tag,

Lisa

CoveredInFlour's picture
CoveredInFlour

The picture is good enough to eat, thank you for sharing this recipe! I make rolls for all the big family dinners, and these would be beautiful on the table.

Thank you again!

Yundah's picture
Yundah

Thanks!  I have long looked for a good brötchen recipe.  I'll give this a try.  I grew up in France and Germany (Air Force brat) and I began baking my own bread because I missed being able to get fresh bread and brötchen by just walking down the street to the local Bäckerei or Boulangerie.   Fröhliche Weinachten.  

 

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

Hey Franko, CoveredInFlour, Yundah, and Patricia:

So happy to know the recipe finds new homes.  Let me know how the brotchen turn out.  They are wonderful with a bit of butter, cheese, your favorite Christmas trukey, ham or roast beef.  My favorite is with cheese because that is how we most often had them in Germany.

I look forward to hearing about the bakng course in Jan/Feb in Germany... How much fun and tasty goodness can that possibly be!

Thanks for comments and ENOY!

whosinthekitchen: Lisa

 

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

Yacoob-

I like it with ww flour also.... but alas, my husband is slow to come around to the fuller flavors of whle wheat, seeds, and other flours.

I keep slipping it in figuring in time, he may say, "I like this better, what DID you do differet?"  

I can dream.  This recipe is the best travel keepsake I ever brought back!

Thanks for popping in...  we like the brotchen for turkey burgers..... Yes, I know... he eats turkey burgers and not ww breads.... he is from Arkansas, USA!!

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

This sounds wonderful!  I am Lisa Combs on face book and would like to follow you and your comments.

Have you done bread courses here in the US?  I live in Florida... and there are not many ops here.

Have a great time.  May you have wonderful travel weather!

I look forward to your posts.

Lisa

hanseata's picture
hanseata

There are many different kinds of German Brötchen. Your recipe shows a kind of Milchbrötchen (milk roll), an enriched dough with a semi-soft crust. I don't doubt that it tastes good, but this is definitely not a typical German Brötchen.

Regular everyday Brötchen have a crisp crust, and, also are not baked like American dinner rolls, touching each other from all sides, thereby preventing crust formation.

It is not easy to make real Brötchen with American flour. If you can get hold of Italian tipo 00 or it's clone from King Arthur, or use pastry flour - that has about the same properties as German Typ 405.

There are several threads in TFL about German Brötchen, you might check those out, too.

Karin (from Hamburg)

whosinthekitchen's picture
whosinthekitchen

I do usually bake them on a sheet not touching for the crust formation.  This recipe came from a German lady I met on a bus in Worms, Germany.

I have made it with the Italian 00 when I can get it.... not an easy item to get locally.

I love collecting recipes and trying them out for comparisons.  No matter what comes from the oven, this is the one my family wants on a regular basis.

Thanks!

Lisa

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Caroline, here's the link to the Italian style KA flour:

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/king-arthur-italian-style-flour-3-lb

Before I found this, I always wondered why my Brötchen were crisp outside, but more like French bread inside, instead of fluffy, with the kind of loose crumb, that you can easily pull out.

This is my favorite Brötchen recipe, it's almost the same you can get in Germany:

http://hanseata.blogspot.com/2010/06/weizenbroetchen-german-rolls.html

Happy new year,

Karin

crazyknitter's picture
crazyknitter

My fondest memories of my years in Germany (Army brat here), were the breads!! Oh!  *drool*.  and brochen was ripe up there on the list of TOP memories.

Hanseata, I am going to have to try your recipe.  Your recipe looks the closest to what I would imagine brochen to be made.

Yundah's picture
Yundah

I made both of these recipes and both were terrific. I did find Hanseata's to be most like the brötchen I ate in Germany but you won't go wrong with either. The key is the flour.

hanseata's picture
hanseata

My husband was an army brat in Germany, too, with glorious bread memories - he is my greatest fan (and the best husband of all!)

Karin

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Patricia, do you know that no such class is being offered in Germany (at least not around where I lived)? When I tried to find a recipe for the normal Brötchen, there was absolutely nothing! The reason is, of course, that nobody in Germany bakes those things that are readily available in more or less good qualitity at every corner. German bread baking books usually have only "fancier" whole grain breads or breads from other countries.

It took a bread baking book from South Tyrol (Richard Ploner: "Brot aus Südtirol") and endless trials with American flours to realize that even with the best of recipes it is the flour that makes the difference in the crumb - and, of course, longer fermentation that make a difference in taste. My Weizenbrötchen and many of the breads I bake nowadays are better than what I get, when I visit Hamburg.

I hope you will enjoy your German bread baking class !

Happy baking,

Karin

AnnaInNC's picture
AnnaInNC

milk. During early morning hours in Thueringen, the baker would deliver hot Broetchen by putting them into my grandma's cloth bag hanging from the second story window, she pulled them up at 8 a.m. and each morning was a treat, butter or no butter :)

anna