Buns

As some of you have asked me, here's how I made the Buns in the earlier post.

Ingredients
Self Raising unbleached flour - 2.5 cups
milk - 1/2 cup
water - 1/4 cup
melted butter - 2 tbsps
dry yeast - one sachet. The cover says '7 grams (15 grams compressed)'.
1 tsp sugar
I forgot to add salt!!!

Method
1. Mix yeast with a little warm water and the sugar as set aside. Within about 5 - 6 minutes it froths.
2 Take the flour in a large bowl and make a well in the center. Add water, milk and butter and the yeast and keep stirring. Once all the dough comes together, take it out on a clean flat surface and start kneading. I kneaded for 10 minutes.
3. Cover it with cling wrap, as set aside for 1/2 hour. I left it inside the microwave as its a 'safe' place!
5. The dough would have risen by now. Punch it down, and make 8 equal sized balls. Knead each ball for about two minutes each, and arrange on a baking tray. Cover the whole lot with cling wrap and leave it aside for 1 hour.
6. I pre-heat my oven (it is fan forced) to 180 degrees centigrade for about 10 minutes.
7. Now bake the buns for 12 minutes (the top becomes a nice pale brown as shown in the picture in the post below)
8. Remove from oven immediately, and quickly coat the top of the buns with melted butter.
9. Loosely arrange the buns into a large bowl, so that they max suface area is free for aeration! (I don't have a wire rack!)

The End!

READ MORE - Buns

My First Buns!

MY FIRST BUNS.......
Okay ...it’s not like it sounds! :-))

Anyway, after a disastrous baking experience in Kolkata that ended with a command (plea?) from my husband, “Thou shalt not bake at home, what can be bought at the grocers” I did not venture again, into the bread, cakes, and cookies world.

But then, the food blogging world has happened! It seems like the whole world is baking, and successfully, by the looks of it! “Hmmm ...but then why is 'Daring Bakers' called 'daring' if it’s no big deal?” I ask myself, even as I smuggle a pack of dry yeast and a kilo of self-raising unbleached flour, into our monthly groceries.

“What’s that for?” asks my husband suspiciously eyeing the small pack of dry yeast that caught his attention. I ramble about the difference in gluten content in Kolkata wheat and Sydney wheat, and a video I saw on Bread making for Dummies, even as the cashier at Coles cheerily packed, billed, and dismissed us with a “Thank you, have a great day”.

“If you must, why don’t you just join a course at TAFE and learn the proper way?” asks Hubby weakly. “Okay” says I meekly, and a tad too fast, putting the topic to an end.

“What can TAFE teach me, that my Foodie World Power cannot?” I say to myself later, as I furiously google away. I find this simple, down-to-earth blog by Rhonda. Wow …simple living is real hard work! Anyway, some simple values rub off on me, and I make up my mind that no ‘no-knead breads’ or short cuts for me, until I first learn the ‘real’ way.

I browse over to thank Purnima - a new visitor to my blog, and here’s is what I find! Thanks Purnima! This is it! The time has finally arrived! A quick jump to Anjali's and Bee’s posts, and the yeast prayer, I begin mixing the flour at 7:16pm. My first buns are ready by 9:46pm.

Served with melted butter, and delicious home made leek and asparagus soup, even hubby gallantly admits it’s a hit.

“I shalt NOT not bake at home, what can be bought at the grocers” I make a determined promise to myself!

READ MORE - My First Buns!