The Fresh Loaf

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A Hamburger Bun

bwraith's picture
bwraith

A Hamburger Bun

A Hamburger BunA Hamburger Bun

I just got a new barbecue grill, so hamburgers were in order. As a home bread baker, I've occasionally made homemade hamburger buns, and there is no question that a hamburger is just better with freshly baked buns.

If you've had the same thought, well here's a recipe for a hamburger bun. The recipe uses direct method instant yeast, so it only takes 3-4 hours. The hydration is a little higher than french bread, but still very easy to handle.

A Hamburger Bun

The Dough:

  • AP flour (I used KA AP) 650 grams
  • Water 290 grams
  • milk 200 grams
  • olive oil 30 grams
  • salt 13 grams
  • 1 package active dry yeast
  • Mix flour, water, milk together using frisage and a few folds, and let sit for 20 minutes.

Mix/Knead

Work yeast into the dough, then work salt into the dough, then work olive oil into the dough. This can be done with a mixer or by hand using frisage and a few folds. Then knead the dough for about 5 minutes until it becomes workable, stretchy, and seems like it bounces back when you punch it, or whatever magic you use to tell if the dough is right. Add flour or water if necessary to make the dough elastic and not too stiff, but it shouldn't spread out when placed on a table. Place the dough in a container to rise.

Bulk Fermentation and Folding (about 2.5 hours)

When the dough has risen by about half, which should happen in roughly an hour, turn it out on the counter, spread it out a little, pressing on it gently. Then, pull a side of the dough and gently stretch and then fold it into the center of the dough. Do this for four sides. You will now have approximately a ball of dough again. Turn it over and push the seams created by the folding under it. Place it seams down back in the container. Repeat this again in about another hour when it should be about double the volume of the original dough when you first mixed it. Then, let it rise for another 0.5 hours or so.

Shaping

Split the dough into ten pieces. I use a scale and break pieces of dough off if necessary. Let the pieces rest for 5 minutes. Take each piece and do the same type of fold as above in the bulk fermentation. You press it down and spread it out gently, and then fold the four sides toward the middle. After folding, turn it over, and make it into a small boule by pushing the sides under and creating some tension on the top surface. Press down on it with your palm again, to seal the seams underneath. Shape all ten buns and place them on a peel or sheet, leaving some room. I had to bake these in two batches in order to have enough room in my oven. Spray them very lightly with oil. Cover them with a towel.

Final Proof

While the buns are rising, preheat the oven to 450F.

Prepare to Bake

Paint the buns with milk and sprinkle sesame seeds on top. Press them down gently with your palm to spread them out a little.

Bake

Bake for about 15 minutes at 450F. The internal temperature should be around 207F

Cool

Let them cool for a few minutes at least.

Comments

browndog's picture
browndog

Lovely they are. Clearly didn't need any advice...and after scanning your process, here's another question. With any dough, since I've started to incorporate folding, I never quite got when to fold, which you've clarified here, though is that a general or dough-specific guideline? And once the last fold gets done, then what, I wondered? Is the dough then supposed finally to kick back and rise til double unmolested (apparently not), which is what I have opted to do, or just one last abbreviated rise like you gave it? And how do you  judge, in that case, when to do what?

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Browndog5,

I'm just reporting what I did to make these. It worked, but as far as any real rules of thumb about when to fold, how much time, etc., I have no clue. I've tried folding early, late, uniformly through the bulk fermentation, without discovering any principles to adhere to. After learning about folding on this site, I tried it and realize it makes a huge difference, especially with whole grains or high hydration doughs. I almost don't bother with much kneading anymore. An autolyse, a frisage, a tiny bit of kneading, and then folding seems to develop the gluten. But, I have not discovered any rules of thumb. In fact, I asked the same question not that long ago on another thread.

I do have an inkling, and maybe there are some more sage experts who can give us both a lesson, which is that you fold enough to get the dough to feel stretchy but not stiff. Talk about relative terms..., but I've found that sometimes you fold it too many times, and it stiffens up the dough, after which the rise and spring don't seem as good. Or, if you don't fold enough, the dough seems too loose and spongy when you get to the shaping stage, and you can't seem to get tension in it without deflating it. There is some happy medium when you've folded just enough to keep the elasticity of the dough without making it too stiff. I've also found that if the dough seems really stiff after folding in two directions, I just leave it at that, and don't do the other folds. For example, I might fold from the north and south, but not from the east and west, if the dough seems very resistant to stretching after the north/south folds.

Some of the best discussion of folding is in Hamelman, but you've probably already read that. It doesn't really tell you how to know the amount of folding to do, but it does discuss the technique at some length.

Bill

edh's picture
edh

Bill,

Have you started using a frisage on all dough? I watched the Julia Child video and was a little confused about when one would do it other than in that specific baguette recipe. Is it just for flour and water, or the whole dough, yeast, salt, and all?

I'm finding that I'm consistantly more pleased with the results I'm getting with higher hydration doughs than with lower, but I'm a long way from knowing what I'm doing with them. There are still moments of OMG, what a gloopy mess I've made! On the other hand, I tried the tuscan bread from BBA yesterday, and while the taste was lovely, the crumb was exceedingly fine, almost cake like. The dough wasn't exactly stiff, quite sticky actually, but not a slack dough at all.

edh

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Edh,

I saw that same video, and I was amazed at how quickly ingredients mix together when you do that. I've been doing a lot more of my doughs by hand lately. The mixer takes extra time, cleaning, and is heavy to move. I just use the frisage as a way to mix ingredients whenever new ingredients need to be mixed. I usually spread the dough out, sprinkle or dig in the ingredients, fold a couple of times to bury the ingredients in the dough, and then frisage to really mix them.

I agree that it's not easy to predict how sticky a dough will be depending on the ingredients. I'm still mystified sometimes, too. I think one key factor is how much acid is introduced. For example when I mix a preferment or sourdough starter into a dough, that seems to make the dough much more sticky and wet than just flour and water at the same hydration percentage. The length of the autolyse step seems to change things, especially if you have whole grain flours or rye. I also see big changes when the salt is added, usually making it much easier to handle.

Bill

ehanner's picture
ehanner

I'm with you Bill, I'm unable to predict how changes in the time in autolyse are going to affect the final dough, other than it will. I've been feeling like I should knead but as you say the stretch and fold seems to be what it needs to develop. Now that I do the frishage to break up any clumps and smooth out the mass in all kinds of dough, the mixer sits in the corner. I think I'm getting better results by hand and it certainly isn't taking any more time or trouble to mix by hand.  

I use the ability of the dough to make the stretch, without breaking, to determine how well developed it is. If I can't pull it out at least double the size I know I need another cycle of rest and stretch. The folding is less important to me as part of the structure building but I could be wrong about this. I fold because I have to lay the now elongated dough somewhere, but I think it's the stretch that helps build the gluten strands.

By the way Bill, when you try out a new recipe like the buns, you seem to be setting the water mark way up there on the wall pretty consistently. You are showing us all what an accomplished baker you are in addition to being a darn good food writer/photographer. Another very nice write up and well documented too. Thanks!

Eric

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Eric,

Thanks for the kind words. These buns were very fast to make, and they made me think of your comments about "plain old" white bread being good for barbecue. These buns seemed at least a little bit like the simple white bread that I've had in southern barbecue places and which you mentioned. They are simpler, faster, and maybe better sized than the ciabatta idea I mentioned before. Everyone was very happy to have them freshly baked with the burgers. The general comment was something like, "it's good how these absorb and hold the juice compared to store-bought burger buns."

Bill

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Bill, I have a batch in ferment now for tonight's dinner. I might of flinched a little as I passed the white WW bag and added a wee bit of goodness!

browndog5, I too have watched as my whole wheat dough stared back at me silently holding its position, refusing to rise. If your yeast is OK then it seems to me the dough is allowing the CO2 gas to pass through without creating pockets of airyness (is that a word?). The dough is leaking so to speak. Believe me, I am not an expert in this area and am barely able to do these things some of the time. That said, my guess is that you could try to do some stretch/fold operations every 30-45 minutes in the bulk ferment as mountaindog has pointed out so well. Understanding her writings on this have taken me to the next level and now I feel qualified to dust the flour off her moccasins. Once the dough will stretch and feels elastic it figures that it will hold air and get larger.

Eric

browndog's picture
browndog

it does rise, not the issue, quite the reverse, it seems to want to rise forever, well, hours, getting airyer (hmm) and (let's try) airier, and I'm thinking, the recipe said 2 1/2 hours, hmmm. I poke it, it fills in, I wait, poke, it fills in...with plenty of nice airy bubbles I might add...then Bill said he gave those buns just half an hour after the last fold, so I'm now assuming I should be parental and tell it I don't care if you're ready it's time to go? It wouldn't matter if I were satisfied with my results, but big tweaks are still well on the forefront of the agenda. Even with steam, stone, preheat which I hate to do, ovenspring has been usually just adequate at best. Texture varies, I guess it's getting better, who knows. I'm not looking for swiss cheese bread at this point. Taste, I get a gold star or two there sometimes. Used to feel quite easy and confident (not to say arrogant) in my dealings with bread dough, but my, how the mighty have fallen.

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Browndog5,

I know what you mean. I usually have a timing issue, i.e. I need to get the bread done before someone becomes annoyed waiting for me or the bread, or I sense that the bread is becoming very pungent and may be too sour for my liking. Either way, I just go to final proof and hope for the best. I think the problem is that you can underknead and underfold, or overknead and overfold. I think that now that I fold, the issue tends to be too much, rather than too little. I can't resist giving it one more stretch, and then it's just stretched too tight and won't spring in the oven or rise well either for that matter. I noticed this with the miche recipe. I got surprisingly little spring on one of my tries, and I had folded 4 times during the bulk fermentation, and one of them was not long before I went to the shaping step. Also, I had probably let the process run on quite long. The next time, I folded three times more the beginning of the bulk fermentation, let it rise another 2 hours or so, and then went to final proof. That time, it was a little too loose, I folded it in the shaping stage again, and then it spread out a bit anyway when I put it on the peel. That one, however, did spring nicely in the oven. I think it would have been better somewhere in between, like fold 4 times, but early on. Or, fold 3 times spread throughout the process, so the fold happens closer to the shaping stage. I don't know if any of this long-winded stream of consciousness is helping, but I definitely understand what you're question is.

Bill

browndog's picture
browndog

Bill & Eric, I believe I've got folding technique down, it seems straightforward enough and in the doughs I've recently handled the results are pretty discernible right off. And okay, I'll blunder through the 'when' forest of learning by doing, but what about the bulk ferment- is the concept of let rise til fully proofed not relevant if it's been going for a few hours and folded a time or two? The books haven't spelled this out as clearly as I seem to need it done, or maybe I'm just missing it. I've had the experience of a dough just going and going for hours during bulk fermentation, especially if I keep it snug, and I'm not at all sure I should let it. I made a batch of dog biscuits last night, just to do something I knew I couldn't screw up. (Well. My pizza crust turned out fine, too. Ahem.)

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Browndog5,

Right, I know just what you mean. The only thing I've tuned into as far as understanding how long to bulk ferment, other than doing the recipe a bunch of times with different timing for the bulk fermentation, is to use the so-called "poke test". You wet your finger or flour it, poke into the dough about 1/2 inch, and then see how the hole you made fills back in. If it fills in quickly, and the dough feels resistant to the poke, then it needs more time. If it bounces back slowly, you're in the right ballpark to move to shaping and final proof, if it doesn't bounce back at all you've let it run too long. Sounds great, except I've found in practice it's a little like reading tea leaves. When I do my miche recipe, as in one of my first blog entries, the poke test seems to work exactly as described above. However, as Da Crumb Bum noticed, it's much harder to tell what's happening with the ciabatta recipe. There it seems to matter where you poke at it for some reason. The side works better for me than the top, and I'm still doubtful it worked at all. With the hamburger bun and olive bread recipes I recently blogged, I was in a hurry, so I took the dough to final proof before the poke test would have said it's ready. It really didn't seem to matter all that much, as far as I can tell. The one thing I noticed is that the flavor is very mild in both cases, even with the SD starter added to the olive bread. 

So, once again, maybe more experienced bread bakers on this site can give us a clue here.

Bill

mnkhaki's picture
mnkhaki

Bill,

 After reading all these posts, unfortunately it seemed my bread proofed in an hour an a half (1.5 hrs). Thats because when I poked it, it didnt spring back up enough... so I'm guessing it overproofed?

It tastes great but the appearance leaves a little to be desired... infact, some of the buns 'tore' either on the top, close to the bottom.

 Some had 'spots' on the top... not outrageous, but small circles which were a tad bit darker... any idea what went, visibly, wrong?

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi Mnkhaki,

When you say proof, do you mean the final proof, i.e. after shaping? It actually does seem kind of long if it is. I think in my case it was only about 45 minutes for the final proof. You should wait for the buns to more or less double in volume, or at least they should be much more puffy and certainly larger than they were when you shaped them.

As far as the bulk fermentation, the dough should about double in total volume, and for me that was about 2.5 hours of fermentation time.

You should get some tension in the surface of the buns when you fold in the edges toward the center. They should have enough tension in them to be "resistant" and they should be tense enough to keep some of their roundness when you first turn them seams down for the final proof. As they proof, their shape should relax and flatten a little.

Ripped sides might actually be a symptom of underproofing, but the timing you describe doesn't sound right for that.

It's possible a lower temperature might help. I wonder if the spots would even out with more baking time?

Bill

mnkhaki's picture
mnkhaki

Bill,

 The 1.5 hours was fermentation, not proof (have to get used to the terminology). The reason why I went to shaping after that time is because when I poked it, it wouldnt spring back at all, so I thought it was over-done as far as fermentation.

I did a fold after an hour, then shaping 1/2 hr after that.

Maybe I'll try them again today. Me and my big mouth - I promised my client mini-burgers so I am making these into small 3oz buns for tomorrow's order. And i've never made buns before!

mnkhaki's picture
mnkhaki

Also, while shaping, some 'bubbles' formed within the dough...

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Well I'm proud to say my buns are great! We just sat down to dinner and the kids loved them. So much more flavor than white bread. That's a winner.

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Eric,

Nice photo. I'm glad it worked for you. The homemade buns do beat the store bought ones, I have to agree.

Bill

mnkhaki's picture
mnkhaki

Both you and Bill have photos of buns that are certainly envious to amateur bakers like me! But I wont give up yet :)

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi mnkhaki,

I'm traveling, and my internet connection is sketchy. Anyway, best of luck. I hope you figure out the trick with it. Let me know if you discover something. It may help someone else.

Thanks, Bill

maggie664's picture
maggie664

Must try these, they look so enticing. Does 1 package of instant yeast weigh 10g.?

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi Maggie664,

I'm not sure it matters too much, but I realize I happened to use a package of Fleishman's Active Dry Yeast, not instant yeast. The package appears to have 7g or 1/4 oz according to the label. If I read correctly in Artisan Baking by Glezer, this would be equivalent to 3.5 grams of instant yeast. However, I don't notice instant yeast being as much more potent as to use double the amount of active dry yeast. I believe the recipe would work similarly with about 1.5 to 2 tsp of instant yeast. I think there are about 2.5 teaspoons in a package of active dry yeast.

Bill

maggie664's picture
maggie664

Must try these, they look so enticing. Does 1 package of instant yeast weigh 10g.?

ehanner's picture
ehanner

I twiddled with the yeast for a bit and decided to use 7 g of instant. It seemed about right. These buns really are tasty and make a tasty pb&j toast sandwich. :0)

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Eric,

OK, that sounds like good advice, as your photo of the buns looked perfect. If I'd had instant yeast packages, I would have thrown in a package and hoped for the best, since I was in a hurry. However, I was just out of my SAF yeast with some on the way from KA among some other stuff, and the store only had active dry for some reason. I went with one package of that. It worked too. I assume the rise times in my recipe above would therefore be a little slower than with a package of the instant yeast.

Bill

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

yesterday afternoon, the picture looked too good and I wanted to suprise hubby.  He had come home and asked "Do we have bread?" :(   and I looked sideways to my rising dough in the bowl.  "Maybe."  (I had thrown about 50g of SD into a poolish for a hybrid and changed tracks when I saw the Buns picture.)  But they still had to be shaped and proofed.  "Grab the bread 'cause we're going out for crawdads!"  
"ah, no, not yet."  I quickly shaped subs instead and gave them 20 min to rise.  Meanwhile a few calls went out to wait for the bread to come out of the oven and there was no protest.  When done, I wraped a tea towel around them and out the door we went.  Grabbed some red wine on the way and 20 minutes later we were hanging over a large stainless bowl filled with spicy hot crayfish smothered in garlic, chilies, & 5 spice sauce with lots of warm bread to dunk.  Wonderful, the first of the season, and messy!  :b..   I'm getting hungry writing about it. Gotta run -- Mini Oven

zolablue's picture
zolablue

...boy, those look good, or should I say boys, those look good - both you and ehanner!

Bill, I was pondering whether to tell you this but I get so obssessed about a challenge and so I did another ciabatta one yesterday.  I will tell you more about that.  In the meantime, know that I took some of my "ciabatta dough" and formed it into 4 nice hamburger buns for dinner last night and were they ever good.  Sourdough ciabatta hamburger buns no less.  We're all crazy, huh!

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Zolablue,

Thanks for the comments on the burger buns. I have thought about just taking the ciabatta dough and shaping burger buns. Sounds like it worked for you, so I'll have to give that a try.

I'll be curious to hear about your further ciabatta experiments. I'm hoping to do one tomorrow. What I'm going to do is use around 20% instead of 30% of the flour coming from the "recipe starter" and use a firm biga-like starter that I let rise by double and have refrigerated for the night. So, it's only about 9 oz of "biga". It should take a little longer to rise, but I'm hoping it may have a better texture and rise and still have a good flavor. Sourdough-guy recommended 20%  for the percentage coming from the starter in a sourdough conversion comment, and I saw an improvement dropping from the 50% level, where it needed an instant yeast boost and basically didn't have a great texture, down to 30%, which got me the results I posted on the blog that I thought were good, even if I can't seem to deliver you the explosive ciabatta dough you're accustomed to with the Glezer recipe.

Bill

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi MiniOven,

Glad you tried it. It does seem to be a good dough for those times when you just need bread fast. I agree that subs would be a good choice. It's basically very similar to what I see as "italian bread" in various books, although I increased the hydration slightly.

Bill

edh's picture
edh

Bill,

I'm going to make your hamburger buns as sub rolls for Maine Italian Sandwiches (different from Italian sandwiches anywhere else) this weekend.

A question; I can't use dairy products, so do you think it would be better to just replace the milk with an equivalent amount of water, or to try to use a substitute like soy (ick) milk? I'm unclear about the purpose of milk in bread, except that I know it has something to do with texture...

thanks,

edh

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi edh,

Soy might work, but I would be worried about the flavor being affected adversely. If you can use powdered milk, you could reconstistute some powdered milk of the same weight as the milk and try that, and also add a small amount more olive oil. Or, try adding water in same weight as milk and a little bit more olive oil - maybe 50% more. I think the milk is contributing some whiteness, some fat, and some soft texture, but if you leave it out and use water and a little more olive oil, it may not be quite as soft and spongey, but it will probably still be good. You might also be able to use some potato or potato flakes. I just made a potato bread, and it has a similar soft, spongey texture. Sorry not to have better detail than that. The potato bread is in a blog entry I just did, and it's the first I've tried. Floydm also had a potato bread blog entry. You might be able to get some idea how to substitute. Offhand, I would bet on substituting 15% of the flour with potato flakes by weight, or 15% of the dough weight with peeled, boiled mashed potatoes. That's just a guess, so if others have better information, have at it. Helmet is on. Good luck figuring something out. Hard to go very far wrong, though, with fresh baked bread and Maine Italian sandwiches. Sounds great...

Bill

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

Milk makes the crumb softer, coconut milk does the same, or just increase the water and not worry about it.  Mini Oven

edh's picture
edh

Coconut it is; I use it instead all the time, don't know why I didn't think of it here.

Thanks for both of your help!

edh

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Sounds good to use coconut milk, especially since MiniOven knows it works. Somehow it sounds better to me than soy milk, although I use plain soy milk on cereal for breakfast once in a while. It just doesn't strike me as good for bread, though. I know people who like it in coffee too, but it doesn't work for me. Someone will probably tell us otherwise. The coconut flavor sounds better, but be careful of kid customers, who might not be hot on coconut flavor in their Italian sub. If that's a concern, I'd go for straight water plus a little more olive oil.

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Soy works fine for milk. I have a Vegan friend  who has become addicted to my 100% WW Tomsbread formula. I don't personally get the whole vegan thing but I respect the discipline required to maintain the diet. The least I can do is gift him with a loaf every now and then. The soy protein does him good.

Eric

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Soy works fine for milk. I have a Vegan friend  who has become addicted to my 100% WW Tomsbread formula. I don't personally get the whole vegan thing but I respect the discipline required to maintain the diet. The least I can do is gift him with a loaf every now and then. The soy protein does him good.

Eric

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi Eric,

That's very useful to know that works. Thanks for mentioning it. I like soy milk plain or in cereal, but I never have tried it in any breads.

Bill

maggie664's picture
maggie664

i would say that milk used in yeast bakery basically enhances the flavour. I use it in bagels but not in focaccia (to which I add crushed garlic and dried basil and olive oil and the texture and flavour is fine). Using soy or coconut milk would add a different dimension of flavour to the rolls and in the case of coconut milk, it would not be compatible with some of the filling combinations. If you were to use soy or coconut milk, you could look for products with less flavour. Creamy Vitasoy is one here that is more palatable than others as is Samoan coconut milk/cream. Even these could be diluted more to use. If I had a cow's milk allergy I would probably opt for using water, a little more oil eg 20g and a beaten egg. If I diluted the soy or coconut cream I would also add the egg and increase the oil.

edh's picture
edh

Heavenly doodads, those are some really great hamburger buns/sub rolls! I'm afraid I'll never get away with serving Italians on bread again, even home made bread.

I ended up replacing the milk with half coconut/half water (in addition to the water called for). Its amazing how the coconut taste just sort of goes away; I use it in all sorts of weird foods now. That was the only change I made from your original recipe.

I mix half soy and half rice milk on cereal, but I can't say I've ever learned to love it. Kind of bleah, frankly.

Thanks for another great recipe!

edh

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Edh,

I'm so glad they worked out well for you. I think MiniOven was the one to suggest the coconut milk. I will have to remember the coconut milk idea. My wife has some problems with dairy products too. Soy milk may work, but I haven't tried it. Maybe someone will chime in to tell us if it would with this recipe.

Bill

mnkhaki's picture
mnkhaki

Hello brwaith

Never mind my previous post about dough....

but what is 'frisage'?

Does KA Bread flour work fine or does AP seem to handle better?

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi mnkhaki,

I'm sure bread flour would work too, maybe with some small texture differences, but that's without having ever tried to make them with bread flour exactly this way. I've done them other similar ways before with bread flour and it worked fine. My guess is if you compared them side by side, the crumb would be a little tougher and chewier with the bread flour.

Bill

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Mnkhaki,

Well, I realize after some discussion here lately that frisage is not necessarily a useful term, as it is spelled and used in all kinds of different ways, after checking more carefully. My apologies for the confusion. All it is supposed to mean is to press the mass of ingredients out along the counter with the heel of your hand. It's just an efficient way to break up and integrate all the ingredients quickly.

You can certainly use a mixer, and the probably the order of ingredients is not very important. I was just describing how I happened to do it in my case. If you do the folding, you don't need to mix very much. The rest time and folding does most of the work of developing the gluten for you. In fact, too much mixing may result in somewhat stiff dough at the time of shaping.

Good luck making hamburger buns.

Bill

bluezebra's picture
bluezebra

LOL, a great baker once wrote, "mighty nice buns boys"! ;)  (humbly thanks zolablue for a great opening line)

Those are totally beautiful and I continued to be humbled by you both!

threadjack:

edh - have you ever tried using almond milk? I regularly sub out coconut milk and I would love to be able to use the almond milk but I have an allergy. Also, you might be able to handle fermented dairy like yogurt and especially if it's yogurt made from goat's milk. Often people with lactose intolerance to cow's milk can handle goat or sheep's milk and the associated dairy from it. Worth a thought anyway!

Back to the rolls. I am going to have to add this to my hit list you know! Thanks again. Bill love your blog. Hope you don't mind me hanging out here and jacking so much of your space.

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Bluezebra,

I'm more than pleased to know you are enjoying this blog. If you try something here, let me know how it goes. It's always interesting to see how things turn out when the conditions are a little different.

Bill

zolablue's picture
zolablue

Sorry, if this was already written but I'm kind of waiting until the last minute to try and whip up some buns for dinner.  I thought this would be a great recipe to try. I didn't see if you said about how many buns this recipe makes. 

Also, I'd like to add a bit of my favorite Hodgson Mills WW graham flour which is quite a bit softer than traditional WW.  So would you think I could use half graham and half white flour? 

I have got to get my buns in gear and get these mixed up now.  Nothing like a pleading, begging poster demanding help right now!  (hehe...thanks, and if nobody sees this in time I'll just go for it and report back later.)

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi Zolablue,

It makes 10 buns. Yes, I don't see why you couldn't add graham flour. Just remember to adjust the water to get the same consistency. Normally with half whole wheat, I'd want the hydration to be more like 77%, whereas this recipe with white flour is probably around 71% if I remember right. However, I'm not familiar with that graham flour.

Bill

zolablue's picture
zolablue

Thanks, Bill, I'm going to give it a go.  Since you know how good I am at math...ahem...I'll probably just slosh some water in and look at the dough.  That's how I do dough really scientifically!  (wink)  The graham flour I use is a whole different animal.  Anything I've added it to, including Pain a l'Ancienne, is just made sweeter so I bet it will be good.  Will let you know.

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi ZB,

I don't doubt you'll know how to adjust the consistency by feel. The dough should be smooth and a little soft. It should be a little more supple and slack than the standard 65% hydration dough. However, it shouldn't be anywhere near as slack as something like the pagnotta recipe.

Bill

bluezebra's picture
bluezebra

Do you think this would work to use a preferment?

I was wondering if you thought this recipe would work?

Sourdough Preferment  (256.13g out of 1140g total flour/water/milk portions = 22.46%)

 

113.88 g of AP Flour (4 oz)

113.88 g of Water (4 oz)

28.37g of Starter (1 oz = 2 Tbsp)

 

Bulk of Recipe

536.12 g of AP Flour (18.831 oz.)

176.12 g of Water (6.186 oz)

200 g of Milk (7.025 oz)

30 g of Olive Oil (2.107 Tbsp)

13 g of Salt (2.74 tsp)

2-1/4 tsp Active Dry Yeast

Then just follow your recipe for the instructions...have you experimented at all with a sourdough version of a hamburger bun?

TIA

bwraith's picture
bwraith

Hi BZ,

Yes, I think it would work to do it that way. I would imagine that the sourdough may make it slightly more chewy in texture, but that's not necessarily burger bun. I could see cutting the yeast down to about 1 tsp, since the sourdough ought to contribute to the rise. However, if you want to make sure it doesn't take too long, maybe staying with 2 tsp yeast is best. You'd hate to be stuck waiting for them on July 4th.

Bill

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