Today I’ll be showing you how to make a batch of crusty sesame seed rolls, they are super easy to make and only require a handful of ingredients – what’s not to like?
If you have been around since the start of the year, you may remember I started my bread series. This series was going to be showing you how to make all different sorts of bread, progressing onto more complex recipes as the year goes on but with the current coronavirus situation, I have decided to take it back to basics, at least for now. I’ll be showing you how to make the few essentials to get you through this time.
This recipe was actually request by a lovely viewer over on my YouTube channel.
I had been planning to simplify my content and had the perfect request – talk about timing right? Anyway, if you have any requests, feel free to let me know via my blog, my socials or on YouTube – I’d love to hear from you.
Anyway, let’s get started, shall we?
Ingredients:
500g Strong white bread flour.
8g Salt.
18g Fresh yeast/7g dried yeast.
30g White shortening.
300ml Water.
Method:
Before you get into the recipe, you’re best to do some prep work. I recommend you start by weighing up all your ingredients, this will honestly save you making mistakes. You should also get any equipment you intend to use ready, such as a stand mixer and a spatula. You may also wish to line your baking tray, but this is completely optional. You will also want to place a 500ml jug of water into the fridge – I’ll explain why later on.
To start on the recipe, grab your mixing bowl of choice and place the bread flour and the salt into it. Give the two a brief mix, just to incorporate the two (if you don’t, the salt has a tendency to deactivate the yeast if they come into direct contact).
You can then go ahead and add in the white shortening (trex here in the UK but any sort of white vegetable fat will work), yeast and water into the bowl and start to mix the mixture on a medium-low speed to start and mix for 5-7 minutes or until a clean dough forms. By clean dough, I mean it should leave next to nothing in the bowl (just a residual bit of flour towards the top of the bowl).
Once your dough is ready, you can flour your work surface and give the dough a brief knead just until the dough is smooth and elastic.
Then you can take a clean large mixing bowl and lightly oil it with a flavourless oil and place the dough into it and cover with clingfilm and place somewhere warm and allow the dough to proof for around 45-1 hour or until the dough has roughly doubled in size.
Once the first proof is done, you can then go ahead and flour your work surface again. Then knock the dough back – this is simply the process of removing the gases that have built up in the dough during the first proof (also shows the yeast is alive and working). knead the dough back into a ball shape, then cover with the clingfilm while you process it.
So, take the total weigh of the dough and divide that by 12 – this will make 12 perfectly sized dinner rolls. Scale the dough off into the correct portion size, it was 70g per roll for me but yours may be slightly more or less. Round the balls of dough off using your palm, the side of your hand and the work surface, they should be smooth balls of dough.
Now take each of the balls and dip tops of them in sesame seeds (you don’t need a lot of them, 50g-100g goes pretty far), then transfer onto a baking tray (I lined mine but this is optional). Make sure you keep them covered loosely with some clingfilm, mostly so they don’t skin over.
Leave them to proof for a further 45-60 minutes or until they are well risen and are batching together – this is also the perfect time to preheat your oven to 230˚c/445˚f. For these rolls to be crusty, you need to make steam in the oven. Of course, not everybody (including me) has a fancy oven with a steam feature or a small proofer at home but don’t worry. While the oven is preheating, place a small tin (not a loose bottomed one) on the very bottom of the oven, allowing it to get hot in the process.
Once your rolls have finished the second proof, remove the clingfilm that was on-top and place into your preheated oven and bake them off for 25-30 minutes or until the are well coloured – just before you shut the oven door, remove the jug of water from the fridge and carefully pour it into the tin that is hot. This will sizzle but will also create steam while the door is shut, so don’t open the door until they are baked!
Now they are baked, simply transfer the rolls from the baking tray onto a cooling rack. This will stop them baking any further – then if you can resist, leave them to cool fully to enjoy the fully flavour.
There you go, a simple and straight forward recipe for you to make while you’re in quarantine and trust me, by the time this period of time is over, you’ll never go back to buying bread, you’ll get use to freshly made better quality bread.
That’s all for today guys, I hope you enjoyed. If you did, don’t forget to share this recipe with your family and friends and enjoy it. I’ll be back soon with another blog post and YouTube video, so join me then. In the meanwhile, don’t forget to check out my Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The YouTube video will be linked down below.
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