LESSON 3 BREAD BAKING

You have already learned the basic essentials for baking a loaf of bread, but where to go from there. Most people are not satisfied with the basic Loaf of bread, in fact there is few if any things that with a little knowledge and practice, you can not make at home. Hamburger Buns, hot dog buns, breadsticks, soft pretzels, bagels and English muffins, are all within your reach. In the scope of this tutorial we will not get to cover all the different things you can make, but I would like to go over a few of the easier variations that you can try.

When I make Hamburger buns, Hot Dog Buns, and breadsticks I make them from the same recipe as my basic white bread.

Basic Frugal White Bread
This white Bread does not take any special ingredients to make, so it both Frugal and easy to make.
2 cups warm water
5 T white sugar or honey
1 1/2 tablespoons yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup oil
5-6 cups flour
In a large bowl, dissolve the sugar in warm water: add yeast.
Mix in salt and oil. Work in the flour until dough no longer looks wet.
Knead on a floured surface until smooth. Place in a well oiled bowl,
turning to coat dough with oil. Cover and allow to rise until doubles, about
1 hour.
Punch dough down. Knead again and divide in half. Shape into two
loaves and place in well oiled loaf pan. Allow to rise for another hour.
bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Loaves with be golden brown
and sound hollow when done.

The most major difference is obviously in how they are formed, and baked. They first thing I do when making any of these is to sprinkle the bottom of a cookie sheet with cornmeal, I do not oil or spray the cookie sheets.

Hamburger buns are made by making a flat disc of dough and laying them fairly close together on a cookie sheet covered with cornmeal. Depending on how big you like your buns, you can get between 15-20 buns from one batch of bread dough.

The way to do Hotdog buns is to separate the dough into 18- 24 pieces first, then, roll them into thin ropes and lay them on the cookie sheet, these should also be placed fairly close together, in the pan, as they will rise more up than out this way.

Breadsticks can be done one of two ways, either way you go, you need to roll the dough out into a thin disc. With the first type you place the entire disc of dough, right onto the cookie sheet with cornmeal Sprinkled on it Put slices in the dough to make strips, and let rise, baste with olive oil and your favorite toppings and bake for 20 minutes at 350.

The second way to do bread sticks is to slice each strip off the round, twist it and place it on the cookie sheet. Let rise, baste with butter and a bit of parmesan.

Toppings for these guys varies, be Creative !!! For Hamburger buns and Hotdog buns, I brush with an egg white and a couple tablespoons of water right before baking them. I sprinkle the hamburger buns with sesame seeds or dehydrated onions, the hotdog buns I don’t put anything on. The Egg white makes them shiny and it helps the the toppings on the hamburger buns to stay on.
Breadsticks I brush with butter or Olive oil, then sprinkle with one or More of the following….
Course Salt
Rosemary
Thyme
Parmesan cheese
Garlic bread seasoning
Sesame seeds

I am only going to mention quickly bagels and English Muffins, I wont be covering them in these tutorials, however I will cover them when we create and release tutorial Cds starting this month.
Bagels are wonderful thing to make. A Fresh bagel from your oven just can’t be beat, and if you make them once, you will never eat store bagels again. They are easy to mix, you want the dough to be fairly stiff. You do a full proof of the dough, first time, but after you form the bagel you only half proof it…. (this makes this a good project for a beginner whose breads do not quite rise well enough) Do not use a regular recipe though, bagel dough is different. After they are half proofed you put them in simmering water, one minute per side. Then drain them on a towl, and put on a cookie sheet with corn meal sprinkled on it, and bake till golden brown….. mmmmm these are the best, Oh and by the way, you can make whole wheat bagels too!!
English muffins are a bit more time intensive, so I am really not going to go into them much, they are a bit more of an advanced project, things you have to look out for, is rolling them thin enough, (nobody likes an English muffin that needs to go on a diet, and wont fit in the toaster ) And to make sure you get the rise times proper, and that you do not allow them to over rise. I will go into those in another tutorial.

Just a couple more short topics I would like to cover in this lesson. Yes you can refrigerate or freeze dough. So it can be made ahead of time and kept for a meal on another day. Please be advised though that yeast dough will continue to rise in the fridge, if a bit slowly, So you would be smart give it plenty of room.

For long term storage, I prefer to bake it first double bag it, and freeze. I don’t like to let bread stay in the freezer for any longer than 2 months though, and be sure that you double bag it, or it might pick up the flavors of the freezer, and that is not necessarily a desirable thing.

At this point there is not much more for me to type on in this set of lessons. Week four was to be for you to bake your bread, and take pics and share. So you are welcome to do so, if you want to send them to me, we will set up a gallery of all your pics as your lesson # 4. So unless I receive some pics there will not be a lesson 4.

Thanks to all of you for your patience, and for sticking with me thru all of this, it has truly been a treat.
It has also inspire us to create a cd out of these tutorials, that will include videos, pics, Recipes and step by steps for each type of recipe. I hope to have that project done soon. Good Luck on your holiday baking projects and feel free to get ahold of me if you have any questions.