S1E3 Showstopper: Bread Rolls

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Week three is coming to an end, and I'm ...tired. 
I'm writing this post directly after completing the first bread week showstopper challenge, during which I had to bake a minimum of 24 bread rolls, three sweet flavours, three savoury flavours, in six hours. 

This challenge was the baking equivalent of juggling. Once I had settled on my flavours, I had to calculate each recipe's timing and work out a schedule. Here's what that schedule ended up looking like:


I highlighted the baking times in orange and then highlighted all of the "hands-on" time in green so that I could identify where my attention needed to be at any given point. Using this as a guide, I broke each recipe down into steps, piecing them together into five pages of non-stop instructions. Honestly, the planning was more work than the actual bake!

I wanted to really push myself and try things that I had never made before, so I chose recipes from all over the world and played around with the flavours until I had a broad range of tastes and bread types. The flavours that I chose were:
  • Rye, ale and oat rolls (based on a loaf recipe from Paul Hollywood's Bread book)
  • Soft rolls stuffed with curried potatoes and peas
  • Challah filled with homemade pesto, goat's cheese and pecans
  • Orange and chocolate challah
  • Chinese pineapple buns (Bolo bao)
  • Swedish cinnamon buns (Kanelbullar)
I was originally planning to do six different types of dough, but that would have been nearly impossible to balance with the bread types that I had chosen, so I decided to do two challahs, one sweet and one savoury. I also had to divide each recipe, some in half, some in thirds and some quartered, so that I wasn't making a year's worth of bread!

My plan was to start at exactly 10am so that I could refer to the wall clock during my bake.

10am and bake!


I started by making my rye dough. Rye flour does not rise very well and needs to be mixed with white flour to provide the necessary gluten. The recipe called for 4 hours just for the first rise, which I was not able to give it, but I was going to give it as much time as I could!

I added the salt, yeast and molasses, and then slowly added a mixture of pale ale and water until the dough came together. The dough felt quite wet when I started kneading, but my research told me that with rye flour, you want to err on the side of moisture.




My rye dough went into the proving drawer and I got started on my challah dough.

I first made challah as a birthday present for a friend in Cambridge and I absolutely fell in love with it. The only concern I had in making challah for this challenge was that the full recipe calls for 1 egg and 3 egg yolks, and I was halving the recipe, meaning that I needed half an egg and one and a half egg yolks, or 2 yolks and half of one white. Luckily, I have a kitchen scale, and the internet says that an average egg white is 15 grams. Math is relevant. Stay in school kids.



When the dough became elastic and soft, I split it in half and put one half straight into the proving drawer with a bowl of boiled water (to create a warm, moist environment to help it rise). With the other half, I kneaded in some chocolate chips and the zest of one large orange, and then placed it in the proving drawer with its friends.


Then, I made my beer batter, a mixture of rye flour, ale and sugar, that would coat the rye buns. I also measured out 30g of oats and set them aside. 

Then I made my homemade pesto with basil, pine nuts, garlic, olive oil and pecorino romano. Pecorino romano is lactose-free as it is both aged and made with sheep's milk, so I can eat as much of it as I want!


Next, I moved on to my curry filling. This needed to be done early so that it would have enough time to cool down before filling the buns.


Unfortunately, my photographer was on a break while I was making the curry filling, but just picture me mashing potatoes, sautéing spices and looking concerned. The recipe I used was for a samosa filling, and I didn't feel that it had quite enough flavour so I tinkered with the spices and added some oat milk to bring it all together. 

Next, I made the dough for my curry buns. This dough was very light and soft and was very easy to bring together. I added a little turmeric to the dough to add a nice yellow colour as well.




At this point, I was about 20 minutes ahead of schedule, which is dangerous in this challenge, because if I got ahead of myself, the proving and baking times would come out of sync. So, I skipped ahead to something that didn't need to rise and made my craquelin for my pineapple buns.

Pineapple buns do not actually contain any pineapple but get the name from their appearance, as the yellow craquelin on top sometimes resembles pineapple once it's cooked. The bun itself is lightly sweetened, and the topping is flavoured with sugar and vanilla, making it taste a bit like a sugar cookie. 

Once the craquelin mixture came together, I formed it into a ball and set it aside.


I punched back my challah doughs and then started my pineapple bun dough.




I also made my cinnamon bun dough during this time, but I think Evie had gotten tired of watching me knead things, so there aren't any photos of me kneading that dough. Here's a picture of me kneading one of the other doughs, just pretend that it fits here:


I also made my cinnamon bun filling at this point, mixing softened margarine, cinnamon and sugar together until it formed a smooth paste.

It was now almost 1pm, meaning that I was half-way through. All of my doughs were proving, and all of my fillings were made. 

It was now time to shape my challah rolls. I started with my chocolate orange dough, as I didn't need to fill it and figured that it would be faster. I decided to make braided rolls for these ones, so I divided my dough into six balls, then divided each ball into three pieces, rolled them out, braided them, and rolled them up like snails.





I washed all the chocolate off of my work surface and then knocked back my plain challah dough and divided it into 6. For these ones, I rolled them out into ropes, flattened them out, spread pesto over them, crumbled the goat cheese over top and sprinkled on the chopped pecans, before closing them up and knotting them.








Then I glazed my sweet challah with egg and oat milk wash and sprinkled them with a little sugar, and then brushed the pesto buns with egg white and salt and sprinkled them with poppy seeds. The tray of challah buns was then covered and set aside for their final rise.


Next, I shaped the pineapple buns:


Then I separated the pineapple bun topping into 6 equal pieces and rolled them into balls. I set them aside.


Next, it was time to shape the cinnamon buns. I turned the dough out and punched it back. I rolled it into a rectangle, spread my cinnamon, sugar and butter mixture evenly on top and rolled it up. I cut the log into ten equal pieces and set them on a tray for their final rise.







Once the cinnamon buns were rising, I rolled the balls of pineapple topping into discs and draped them over the resting buns.


The pineapple buns were then ready to go into the oven! I put them in and set a timer.

I pulled the rye dough out of the proving drawer, and notice that it still hadn't risen much even after three hours. Nevertheless, I "knocked it back" and divided it into six equal balls. I shaped them, coated them with beer batter and oats and covered them for their final rise.






I'll be honest, the colour of the rye buns was not appealing...

Finally, it was time to shape my curry buns. I divided this dough into eight pieces, rolled them into balls, flattened them out, spooned in the mixture, folded the dough and pinched it closed and set them on a tray for their final rise.



Short intermission to take my pineapple buns out of the oven and to stick the challah tray in.


Now back to the curry buns.




Once the curry buns were shaped, I pulled the challah out of the oven to reapply the eggwash.


They went back into the oven for another ten minutes, and then they came out and went onto the cooling racks.


I changed the oven temperature, and then it was time to get the cinnamon buns ready to bake. I brushed them with the milk and egg wash and sprinkled them with pearl sugar. In they went!


Eight minutes later, they were ready!


I adjusted the oven temperature again, brushed the curry buns with the salted egg wash and sprinkled them with paprika and sesame seeds. Then they went in.



And then they were done!


We didn't get any pictures of the rye buns going into, or coming out of, the oven. It's okay though because they really didn't change much through the baking process, so you didn't miss anything.

That being said, the rye buns came out of the oven, and with that, I was done! I did it!!


Time: 5 hours, 31 minutes

Now it was finally time to eat! I gotta tell you, after almost 6 hours of baking, I was famished.

So, let's judge these puppies!

Bun #1: Rye, Ale and Oat Rolls


I was very worried about these rolls. They didn't rise at all, and I overbaked them so the bottoms were burnt. However, they were very nice and soft in the middle and they had a really nice flavour. These ones ended up being my dad's favourite! The judges determined that the only bad thing about them was the fact that they were burnt on the bottom, and it was recommended that I use a darker ale. Next time, I'll also make them a bit bigger so they don't look like hockey pucks.

Bun #2: Soft Rolls Stuffed With Curried Potatoes and Peas


These ones were awesome. The filling was delicious, the bread was so light and fluffy, and they were so nice to look at! They could have used a bit of salt, and the buns formed air pockets around the filling, making them seem like they were only half-filled. It has been requested that I make them again with more filling and more heat. Regardless, they were high on everyone's list, and they were my brother's favourite of the savoury buns.

Bun #3: Challah Filled With Homemade Pesto, Goat's Cheese and Pecans


These were one of my favourites. The dough was fluffy and a little bit sweet, the pesto was nicely salty, and the pecans added a nice texture. Altogether it was very well balanced. My mom really wants me to make a giant loaf of this. Most of the judges rated this one as their second favourite overall.

Bun #4: Orange and Chocolate Challah


These ones tasted lovely, but ended up on the bottom of everyone's lists, probably because the flavours weren't as powerful as the others. Their texture was, dare I say, perfect, and the chocolate and orange both came through and paired well. One thing I would have done to improve for next time would be to knead in some more chocolate chips right before shaping them. The chocolate all melted during the proofing stage, so the chocolate was mixed into the dough and we lost the texture of the chocolate chips. 

Bun #5: Chinese Pineapple Buns (Bolo Bao)


These ones were a total winner. Everyone loved them. They were described as "sweet clouds". The bun itself was fluffy and light, and the craquelin on top was crunchy and sweet. There was a strong and pleasant vanilla flavour, and they're also so nice to look at! I was very happy with them, and honestly I really just want to go back and grab another one. No one expected these ones to be their favourite, but they were number one on four out of five of the judges' lists.

Bun #6: Swedish Cinnamon Buns (Kanelbullar)


I need to give a special shout out to my friend, Linnea, for translating and sending me this recipe all the way from Sweden. I'm definitely going to keep this recipe in a safe place. These buns are so light and fluffy, and they were really easy to make! Honestly, why haven't I gone to Sweden yet? Is there anything the Swedish can't do? The judges said that these tasted like Christmas and were far superior to the classic American cinnamon bun.

If you read all the way to the end, congratulations. This was a marathon both of baking and of blogging, and I'm glad we're all safely on the other side.

I'm going to bed now.     

Recipes used: 

Swedish cinnamon buns: top secret (definitely not printed on the sides of Swedish flour packages)

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