A new recipe! Finally!! Hopefully one that you could serve at a dinner party before the meal, class it up and give it that fancy restaurant feel! Full disclosure, I did learn this recipe at school, but they made us do complicated knots with them, which frankly was a little unnecessary! What’s wrong with just a good honest bread roll?
I’m so sorry that it has been so long since I posted a new recipe. The end of term at Le Cordon Bleu has had me pretty busy! And, I’ve been feeling a little lazy too to be perfectly honest. When you’re in school baking during the week it doesn’t always appeal to you when you get home. But, I’m back on the baking horse now, so hopefully you’ll be getting some more recipes and reviews in the lead up to Christmas!
Before we go into the recipe, I would like to just take a minute to tell you about why I decided to make bread rolls. My friend Zen, otherwise known as @greedygirlgourmet on Instagram (check her out, she does some amazing food, not just desserts), challenged me to take part in #foodbloggerschristmas. The idea behind #foodbloggerschristmas is that as food bloggers we often have food left over, especially when we are making recipes to serve 10 or more people. I don’t know about you, but I can’t eat a whole lemon tart or three tier cake in one sitting! So rather than give this extra food to our friends, housemates, family etc, OR let it go stale and have to throw it away, we would hit the streets and offer it to the homeless. However, when you make mostly cakes, tarts and biscuits, that’s not exactly what you want when living on the street. So, I decided to make bread rolls and a big pot of hot jambalaya and hit the streets with that. I thought something a little more filling would be better.
If you want to help the homeless in your area by trying to give them food, make sure you ask first. The people I spoke to were for the most part just grateful I asked, even those who turned it down. A lot of people who are in this situation do already have access to food, whether it’s through soup kitchens and shelters, or other people who have done the same thing you are trying to do.
If you want to help out without hitting the streets, there are a load of charities you can donate to, such as Crisis and Shelter, who also have a lot of information on how else you can help. You can also help by using an app called StreetLink, where you can send in information about a rough sleeper you are worried about, and they will send out someone to connect them to the local outreach service and provide them with help. If you aren’t sure if that is the right thing to do, if you think that the rough sleeper is already aware of these services and you don’t want to bother them, or whatever else you might be worried about, ASK them. They’re normal people, mostly just down on their luck, they’ll generally be happy to talk to you, especially if you’re offering help in some form. Don’t be offended if they turn the help down, but you won’t know if they need that help until you ask!
One final note before we dive into the recipe, I met a lovely Scottish man called James last night who is currently sleeping rough, but is about to start a cookery course, which ends in June and will give him certification of his skills. If anyone knows of a London based restaurant or cafe that would like to hire someone like James in June, please let me know so that I can get him in touch with them!
Makes 20 small dinner rolls
Ingredients
Method
In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar and salt.
Make a well in the middle and pour in the water and melted butter. Mix this a couple of times to start combining it all together.
Add in the yeast and then keep mixing until it is all well combined. I like to use my D Scraper, which is really just a piece of stiff plastic to chop and mix, as it makes me feel like I’m in control.
Once the dough has come together, turn it out onto your work surface. DON’T flour the surface. Your dough may well be sticky, but it will get less sticky as you knead it. You can flour your hands a little, and then start kneading. You want to knead for 8-10 minutes until it is all smooth and elastic.
Once you have kneaded, put the dough back in the bowl and cover with clingfilm or a tea towel and leave to prove at room temperature until it has roughly doubled in size. This could take up to an hour, depending on your yeast and the temperature of your room.
Turn the dough out and knock it back a bit. I like to just cut into quarters and slam the heel of my hand into each piece to flatten it. It’s pretty therapeutic.
Start dividing your dough into equal sized pieces. If you are a perfectionist like me, you can weigh them to make sure they’re all even. Roughly 45-50g is a good guideline for a small dinner roll. Cover the pieces you aren’t using with clingfilm or a tea towel so they don’t dry out.
Preheat your oven to 50-60C.
Roll the pieces into balls. I do this by moving my hand with my fingertips tucked underneath in a sort of claw shape in a quick circular motion.
Place on a lightly greased or lined tray and allow to prove in the oven at 50-60C for about 8-10 minutes.
Take the rolls out and raise the temperature of the oven to 190C. They will keep proving a bit at room temperature, so don’t forget about them! Once your oven is heated, bake the rolls for 12-15 minutes until golden brown and nicely crusted on top.
Enjoy warm with a slather of butter. Yum!
