Since I am trying to make all our bread now, I have to practice! Sometimes I’ve been successful and sometimes not. I also want to talk a little about how my sourdough starter has been doing!
We tried making homemade hot dog buns last week. They tasted good but they turned out flat. I think I know why though. I didn’t add enough flour to the dough. I’ve noticed that most of the time I have to add a lot more flour than is called for in the recipe to get to the texture that it is supposed to be. Maybe I am not measuring my flour properly. The dough for the hot dog buns ended up so sticky that it was impossible to work with. At least now we know what to do for next time!
On Saturday, we had homemade pizza. I doubled the recipe and still didn’t feel like it was enough crust. I think I might have messed up on my timing with this though. The dough needed to rest and rise longer in the pan. I did use my sourdough starter as most of the raising agent so that probably contributed to the longer rising time. The pizza was good though and had a great crust because yesterday we ate up the rest of it (and I guess it was enough crust!)
One bad thing about making bread in the afternoon to be used as part of dinner: Dinner ends up being late! We usually eat around 5 PM, but because of my bad timing, we have been eating around 6 to 6:30 PM lately.
I also made crackers again with my sourdough starter last week and of course, the crackers were all gone by the end of the day. My kids seemed to be addicted to them. I do need to figure out how to roll the dough out thinner though. The middle ends up too thick and doesn’t get crispy when baked. I am considering splitting the dough in half and rolling out smaller portions to get the thinner dough.
So my sourdough starter is still alive and happy. I have it out on the counter right now so I can feed it before I go to bed. We also went out to a warehouse grocery store after Josh got home from work today and I needed the fridge space! So out came the starter to sit on the counter overnight.
Yesterday, dinner was late again because I was making hamburger buns from scratch. I think if I had started the dough around 1 PM like I had been planning that I would have been okay, but no, I was a little bit scared of making burger buns from scratch and was actually trying to think of something else to make for dinner! In the end, I started my dough around 2 to 3 PM. I will say that making hamburger buns from scratch isn’t easy! I used a recipe from one of my newer cookbooks, Brown Eggs and Jam Jars: Buttermilk Oat Hamburger Buns. It uses some good for you ingredients: old-fashioned oats, whole wheat flour, honey. I think there were 3 times that I had to let it sit for around a total of 2 hours and 15 minutes of resting/proofing.
You can check out Brown Eggs and Jam Jars at Amazon at this link, or just click the following image of the book.
I know these buns must have tasted good because my youngest boy ate one without a burger in it, and my oldest boy asked if he could have another bun (no burger) after he had finished his first burger.
-Lynn
Your buns look healthy/wholesome and tasty too with the whole wheat. The commercial ones are sweeter and that’s the trick to getting a FAST hamburger and hot dog bun … more sugar and yeast. Minimal handling/kneading is necessary cause you don’t need to build up the gluten to give you structure or support for your rising buns.
If you look back at the fall bread experiments I did, I made a 40 minute hamburger bun here. (GO down past the English muffins.)
https://aboleyn01.wordpress.com/2015/09/11/english-muffins-and-hamburgerhot-dog-buns/
Here’s the hot dog post though you can use the previous recipe for both. To get buns that don’t flatten out, you need to find the perfect sized pan/ hot dog bun ratio. (See the pictures for before and after resting and after baking.) You have to fit your buns quite tightly together so that when the heat of the oven hits them, they have nowhere to go but UP. I used some discard sourdough starter PLUS a lot of regular dry yeast. With the short rise time it was necessary to get that puffy texture inside.
https://aboleyn01.wordpress.com/2015/10/15/home-made-hot-dog-buns-with-sourdough-starter/
Substitute at least 1 cup of whole wheat flour for the all purpose flour into the recipes if you enjoy it.
My next bread-making experiment will be your pretzel rolls! I’m looking forward to trying them. We just have to eat up some of the bread we have first.
I know what you mean. I’m down to the last 2 ‘baked’ donuts in my freezer though I still have 2 pretzel buns. (They make great bases for my prime rib sandwiches.)
I am rehydrating a batch of sourdough starter (from the dried and ground jar) cause I want to make your sourdough crackers. I may use my pasta maker to roll them out really thin. 🙂
PS: Have you tried the cheddar cheese crackers I made before Xmas? They were SO good and you don’t need cheese to eat with them cause they’re already so cheesy. I munched my way through the whole batch.
cheddar cheese crackers? Oh yes, I must try those! My kids would probably eat them all in five minutes!
The crackers were part of the chocolate truffle post. 🙂
I have a cookie press which I used to pipe them out though you could certainly roll them out too. The dough shouldn’t be anywhere near as resistant as the sourdough starter one you used. They were pretty thick so if you want crispier crackers, roll them between 1/8-1/4 inch thick, whichever you prefer. And you might want to reduce the amount of the dry mustard and cayenne pepper for the little ones.
I had so much fun making these.
https://aboleyn01.wordpress.com/2015/12/21/cheddar-cheese-crackers-or-straws-and-some-chocolate-truffles/
I will probably make these the same day I make the pretzel rolls 🙂 I do have a cookie press so I will try using that. I can do some fun designs for my kids. I will take your advice on the spice! My kids aren’t used to heat like Josh and I am.
Those look delicious! I’d love to learn to make homemade bread without using my breadmaker. Someday maybe!?
They were very good. Nice and fluffy.
I love making bread. No batch ever turns out the same. One very important variable is to use high quality flour. The bit extra you pay for the high quality flour really makes all the difference.
Homemade bread is one of the most comforting foods! My kids love it even when it’s not perfect. I’ve worked with King Arthur flour before and really liked it, but usually I buy my flour from the wholesale store. Thanks so much for commenting! I might have to look into buying a bag of high quality flour for special bakes.