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If you’re going to have a plated and fancy breakfast with eggs Benedict and Hollandaise sauce, good breakfast rolls are a must.
The Viennese are renowned for their pastries and breads and the Viennese breakfast roll is up there with the best of their breads.
This is a recipe I picked up in the pastry kitchen at the Elma Art hotel on the northern coast of Israel.
Ingredients (makes about 30 bread rolls)
- 1125 g bread flour
- 22 g dry yeast
- 18 g baking/dough enhancer
- 22 g salt
- 45 g sugar
- 113 g sourdough starter
- 28 g honey
- 413 g water
- 113 g milk
- 1 large egg
- 113 g sour cream
- 90 g soft butter
- 2 eggs for egg wash. For brushing, add a little water and pass through a sieve to avoid streaking in the glaze.
NB: Baking or dough enhancer is really only required when freezing dough or pastry with yeast in it. The baking enhancer is an enzyme that envelops the yeast, protecting it from the temperatures of the freezer and ensuring the yeast remains healthy and does its stuff when defrosted.
Method
Place all dry ingredients in a mixer bowl and mix on slow for a couple of minutes. Combine the liquids, the large egg, sourdough starter and honey in a bowl or measuring jug and mix well together. Slowly add the liquids to the dry ingredients. When the dough is combined, mix for 3–4 minutes on slow, then slowly add the sour cream and then the softened butter. Once absorbed, turn the mixer onto medium speed for 8 minutes. Leave the dough in the mixer and cover for about 30 minutes.
Lightly dust the work surface with flour and tip out the dough. Using a kitchen scale, cut dough into 55 g chunks (there should be about 30). Take each piece, fold it several times in your hand, then move it in a circular motion on the work surface to shape and tighten the dough into a perfect ball. Place on a baking paper lined baking tray with at least 4–5 cm separating each ball of dough.
You can take all or some of the rolls and freeze them on the tray, then transfer into a plastic box for use another day.
Brush the rolls for the next morning with egg wash (save the remainder of the egg wash for brushing again in the morning). Leave the rolls to rise for 30–40 minutes and then place in fridge and cover loosely with cling wrap after an hour. Leave in the fridge overnight.
In the morning, heat the oven to 190°C (without fan) and place a baking tray at the bottom of the oven to heat up. Remove the rolls from the fridge, gently remove cling wrap and delicately brush the rolls a second time.
To get a harder outer surface on the bread, steam is needed for several seconds at the beginning of baking. Most people don’t have combi-steam ovens, so we have to improvise. When you are ready to bake, place the trays with the rolls in the oven, tip a little water on the tray previously placed at the bottom of the oven and close the door quickly. The water will steam and produce a crust on the rolls.
Bake for around 20–25 minutes. Remove to cool and you will have one of the best breakfast rolls known to mankind for your breakfast table.
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