The Lost Symbols - Hot Cross(??) Buns for FFTO

I've been neglecting my blog. But both me and my laptop are back on our feet and will be more attentive.
This month's FFTO challenge, hosted by Sarah of Simply Cooked, was baking Hot Cross Buns, all in the spirit of Easter. Most of us know the popular rhyme with the same name, but I really didn't know that this sweet-spicy bread was associated with Easter and that's why it had a cross.
I made the bread as soon as the challenge was posted and just couldn't not tweak it. I made it eggless for one,  substituted half the all purpose flour with whole wheat flour and didn't add any raisins or candied citrus peels (not too fond of raisins in my bread).
Oh! And the crosses I piped on the buns disappeared......

Sarah's recipe for Hot Cross Buns:

Flour: 3 1/2 - 4 cup (440 - 500 g)
Milk: 3/4 cup (190 ml)
Water: 1/2 cup (125 ml)
Yeast: 1 package (2 1/2 t)
Sugar: 1 Tbsp
Sugar: 1/4 cup (65 g)
Salt: 1/2 tsp
Butter: 1/4 cup (55 g), melted
Allspice: 1/4 tsp
Cinnamon: 1/2 tsp
Nutmeg: 1/4 tsp
Eggs: 2
Currants: 2/3 cup (100 g)
Diced Citron: 1/4 cup (40 g)

egg glaze:
1 egg

lemon glaze:
Sugar: 1 cup; powdered
Lemon zest: 1 tsp 
Milk: 1 1/2 Tbsp

"In a mixer bowl, combine 1 c (125 g) flour, milk, water, yeast, and 1 T sugar. Beat well. Set in a warm place until frothy. melt butter; cool. To the yeast sponge, add remaining sugar, salt, melted butter and spices; beat in eggs, one at a time. Add 1 c (125 g) flour and beat 5 minutes with electric mixer. Gradually add remaining flour, currants, and citron. Turn out onto floured board and knead until smooth and elastic (8 - 10 minutes). Place in a greased bowl, turning to grease top of dough. Cover with kitchen towel and set in warm place until doubled in bulk. Punch down. Turn out onto lightly floured board and knead lightly for 2 minutes. Divide dough into 24 equal parts and shape into buns. Place well apart on greased baking sheet. Cover and let rise until almost doubled in size (about 30 minutes).

Make a cross (X) on each bun with a razor blade or sharp knife. Brush with egg yolk beaten with 1 T water. Bake at 375 F (190 C) for 15-20 minutes or until golden in colour. Cool on wire rack.

Make the glaze by mising the ingredients. Drizzle over buns in the cross design.

Some English recipes add strips of pastry dough over the cross before baking, instead of the icing." 


My tweaks:
Flour: 2 cups All purpose flour and 2 cups whole wheat flour
Flaxseed meal: 1tbsp in 3 tbsp of hot water (egg replacer)
Spices: 1/tsp each of cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, pepper
Sugar: 1/3 cup
While kneading I went by feel, and used about 1 1/4  cup of milk and 1/4 (+) of water to get an elastic but slightly sticky dough.
I didn't use currants/ raisins/ citron.
Omitted the lemon in the glaze.
Also, I piped pastry strips (1 Tbsp Cornstarch + 2 Tbsp APF + water = piping consistency)to make the crosses.
All done, and I set the buns off to bake and kept peeking to check for browning. Everything was going fine, but when the timer struck, pulled the baking tray and the crosses were as brown as my crust :(
I added the glaze mournfully.....I went the pastry strip route since the pictIures I;d seen were soooooooo nice.

I waited till it cooled down a bit and took a bite.....yummy in the tummy! (That's what my daughter says to something she likes!!)

Till I took that bite, I wasn't really sure how it would taste. It tasted good :D

The Challah Experiment for Fresh From the Oven

It's been a month since my last post and I am back with another post for the FFTO February challenge. I've never seen or even heard about the Challah and was glad for the opportunity to acquaint myself with this delightful loaf. The Challah is a traditional Jewish bread and this challenge was hosted by Dom of Belleau Kitchen and to quote Dom:

"For those who don't know, Challah is the sweet, light and eggy bread traditionally served on the Friday night Sabbath..." . For those interested in more details please to check this link.

Ingredients: 

(Dom's Recipe)

Yeast : 1 sachet easy blend dried yeast (about 1 1/2 tsp)

Honey : 1tsp 

Milk : 8fl oz (about 1 cup); lukewarm

Butter : 50g; melted

Flour : 16oz (about 450 gms; I used all purpose flour/ maida)

Salt : 1 tsp

Eggs :2 lightly beaten - in separate bowls - one for the mix and one for glazing (I used only one and in later versions omitted it)

Poppy seed or sesame seeds (optional)

Quoting Dom again  .....

"Combine the yeast, honey, milk and butter, stir and leave for 15mins to dissolve

In a large bowl, mix together the flour and salt.  Make a well in the centre and add the yeast mixture and one of the beaten eggs.  Stir to make a dough. (It will be very sticky and will definitely need extra flour for kneading)

Knead till smooth and elastic (a good 15 mins) then transfer to a clean bowl, cover and leave to prove for 1 1/2 hours.

Grease a baking sheet. Knock back the dough and divide into 3 equal pieces.  Roll to shape each piece into a long strip for plaiting.

Brush with egg and bake in a hot oven at 190 for 35 - 40 mins or until golden and sounds hollow if you tap it."

My Experiments in Challah Baking:

Challah 1: Used the recipe provided by Dom. Made only one slight modification, I brushed the loaf with a table spoon of milk and a wee bit beaten egg left in the bowl. The bread was super soft and toasted well. It disappeared so soon, i just had to make it again.... :)

Challah 2: Same ingredients except replaced egg with 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseed powder dissolved in 3 tablespoons of water. The dough needed a bit more milk while kneading. This bread turned out just as good except wasn't as soft. The flaxseed gave a nice nutty flavour.

Challah 3: Made two more changes - used half whole wheat flour and vegetable oil (1/4 cup) instead of butter. This dough needed more fluid for kneading and I used milk initially and then water. I went by feel and waited for the springy-smooth stage before leaving it to rise. I also made the strands a bit longer, which needed a shorter baking time and was more the pull apart variety than slice-and-eat :) The bread was obviously denser but enjoyable just the same. And this will probably be the Challh recipe I'll be keeping.

I braided all three Challah using Dom's instructions (you can look it up here), but I found many versions and am especially fascinated by the six strand variant and hope to try it sometime.

I'm sending my Challah to Susan of Wild Yeast to have them yeastspotted!

Khrushchev Dough for Fresh From the Oven

One of the many things that prompted the evolution of The Black Ladle were the numerous food blog events and challenges. But having started this saga, I found Fresh from the Oven  FFTO) and promptly joined them.... And have even managed to do this month's challenge. You can look up FFTO's public blog here.

This month's challenge the Khrushchev Dough was proposed by Silvia and Ivan of mushitza. Wikipedia has an entry for our challenge which simply states that the dough was a result of introducing flour rationing and also that the dough may have been long lasting - in terms of shelf-life, I guess. Non-wikipedia sources claim it to have been a favourite of the Russian leader Nikita Khrushchev.

History lessons apart, the challenge this time was not the process but in shifting your mindset. To quote Silvia and Ivan: 

"There are two key factors about achieving a good dough that do NOT apply here:

1. Never mix yeast directly with the salt. Exactly the opposite is what you have to do here. Since the salt kills the yeast when in direct contact we are using double amount of the yeast than we would usually use for this amount of flour.
2. Leave the dough to temper for an hour or two after taking out of the fridge. Not here. Work with the dough directly when out of the fridge. It's essential for the dough to be cold, otherwise the butter will start to melt and absorb more flour which isn't desired."

See what I mean? I remember reading these two points many times before it actually sunk in. But the results were worth the effort :)

Ingredients:

Yeast - 40 gms fresh yeast (or 10 gms dry yeast in 30 gms/ml of water)

Salt - 10 gms

Milk - 250 ml; cold

Butter - 150 gms; unsalted (cut into cubes)

Sugar - 1 tbsp

All purpose flour - 500gms

Silvia and Ivan's instructions :

If using fresh yeast: Using an ordinary tablespoon rub the salt through the yeast block till it becomes liquid.
If using dry yeast: Mix salt and dry yeast, then add the water.

Mix the yeast and salt, add in milk butter, sugar and sift flour on top. Mix using an electric mixer with dough hook or a wooden spoon. Transfer to airtight container and keep in refrigerator overnight. The dough hardens in the fridge (butter) but does rise  a bit. Next morning, dust counter, place dough, work it minimally and shape it as you please. 

Ivan and Silvia showed us what all the dough could be metamorphosed into....look here for inspiration. The dough can be used to make almost anything - bread, donuts, rolls, sweet, savoury....whatever :)

What happened to my dough?

Well after memorizing the two cardinal rules for this dough, my immediate stumbling block was the yeast and salt (surprise! surprise!). I tried but couldn't locate instant yeast. So  had to resort to active dry yeast. Then came to phase two of the problem: weighing out 10 gms of yeast and 10 gms of salt. The only place with a fine balance for this was the jewelery store somewhere in the vicinity and I'm not sure my earnest request would have been obliged. I had to resort to some vagueness in the measuring of these two ingredients. 

The active dry yeast comes in 25 gm packet. It measured about 5 tablespoons with some left. Simple math - used 2 tablespoons and the leftover as well. I googled for weight to volume conversion with respect to salt and 1 tablespoon table salt  = 18.25 gms. I ignored the 0.25 gms and used one and half teaspoons of salt. There end of yeast and salt ordeal.

I proceeded as instructed and tucked the bread away in the fridge. The next evening, I opened the container and wasn't sure if the dough had risen, but it sure smelled yeasty :) I didn't have the time to get too fancy (and it may not have been fancy even if I'd tried) and used the dough as it was. I made spirals and buns and used the kitchen scissors to snip them here and there - my attempt at decoration. Oh! I preheated oven to 180C.

Put the dough and started peeking into the oven every 10 minutes. My spirals and buns were small and so were nicely browned and ready in less than 15 minutes. Left them to cool on the wire rack and totally forgot about photographing them and managed to salvage only a few. 

The bread was delicious, especially when warm. Soft, buttery and absolute heaven when had with honey or jam!