Yeast Dough Buns - AKA Bułeczki Drożdżowe

Today's cooking adventure - Yeast Dough buns - AKA Bułeczki Drożdżowe

With holidays and LOTS of time to spare I decided to venture out and bake something.. Baking is not my strongest point, but I've wanted to make these Polish fruit topped buns for ages, so I thought I'd give them a shot. I had my almost 3 year old son helping, hence the little hands in the pics and the 'artistic' presentation!

The recipe is based on one my sister used but I also used the dough to make mini cupcakes...

So if you'd like to make these, here's the recipe for you... To start you'll need to make the yeast base, for which you'll need:

14g dry yeast
1 tbs sugar (I used the fruit sugar which is apparently healthier than normal one but it's sweeter)
1 tbs flour
7 tablespoons warm milk
1/2 teaspoon salt

** Make sure your milk is warm but not too warm (I checked the temp and it was just a little more than luke warm) as otherwise it kills the growing ability of the yeast**

Mix the above ingredients in a bowl and let it sit for about 15 mins.

You'll see little bubbles forming in the mixture..

The rest of the ingredients are:

500g flour (little more if needed)
150g unsalted butter
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 tbs vanilla essence


1. Melt the butter in a pot over a small flame. Add milk. Wait for it to cool a bit (I have a feeling that adding the hot butter straight to the yeast mixture would kill the yeast )

2. Add the 3 eggs, vanilla and sugar to your yeast mixture.

3. Pour in the butter/milk liquid then quickly sift in your flour (If your butter is too hot your eggs will probably start setting)

4. Mix the ingredients with a spoon then knead the dough in the bowl or on a board / plate till it's all combined..

5. Place the dough in a clean bowl, cover with glad wrap, then with a tea towel and place in a warm place. Apparently the dough likes to be in the dark. I found that my living room which has the heater was a nice warm place. BUT do not place the dough in front of direct heat. I once did that and the dough got a crusty outside and didn't grow.. Anyway, let the dough sleep like that in it's warm dark place for about an hour..

6. After the hour the dough will hopefully be twice its size. Take it back to your bench and knead it again.

7. Now is the fun stage - shaping your dough! If you want to make the big flat buns, roll the dough into balls about 4cm in diameter then push them down on your tray lined with baking paper to the desired size/shape. I found that the dough needed to be pulled into shape a bit.. But I think these can be a bit 'free form'.

You can also make smaller balls and just push them into mini patty pans (I think that's what those paper things are called).. Leave room for them to grow and for the decorations..

8. Decorate your dough - I put defrosted raspberries and crumble on the bigger buns as well as on some of my cupcakes ones (making the crumble is a whole different story! - read below!)

I got a bit adventurous and also make some cupcakes with the raspberries in the middle and blanched almond pieces on top.

I also made a bear shape, but as you can see I don't think we'll be eating him!

9. Once you're happy with all that, let the dough sit again until it grows to the size you're happy with.

10. Pop into a cold oven. If you want the dough to grow a little more turn the oven to 50 degrees, every 5 mins or so increasing it till you reach 160 degrees (fan forced oven).

11. For the baking time - I recommend that you use your judgement and don't get distracted by the net like I did! The guideline is to bake these for about 45 mins (or till golden brown).. I got a little distracted and the trays that were on the top rack, well those 'buleczki' got a little too brown.. I guess the colour suits the bear though! So just keep an eye on your oven or you'll end up with crusty tops like we did...

On the up side, though the tops were a little browner than I hoped for, the insides were perfect!

Aaa.. and making the crumble - that was a cooking adventure in itself! I started off with too much butter and so we used half of the mixture to make biscuits, then added more flour to make the actual crumble.. here's the biscuits before going in the oven:

Humble carrot pineapple salad

The carrot + pineapple salad is one of my favourite salads (you know the one - grated carrot which you mix with canned pineapple pieces)..

While making it recently, I began to wonder how many different versions of this salad are out there.. I know of the 'carrot + pineapple + sultanas + coconut', but I'd like to find out about the other versions of this salad - as I said, it's one of my favourites! So if you know of another versions, please let me know via the comments section below...

I look forward to all the suggestions!

Feta, pear and greens salad

I recently saw a recipe for barley, feta and pear salad, which inspired me to make the following Feta, pear and greens salad.

Here's what you'll need:
- leafy salad mix (I had a 175g pack and used about half of it)
- 1 cup salad sprouts
- 1/2 to 1 green firm pear
- about 1/2 cup walnuts
- about 50g smooth (like danish feta) feta
- oil, salt, pepper to taste

This is quite a quick salad to make:

1. Cut up the feta into small pieces. Core the pear and cut into slices/wedges/cubes (up to you how you prefer it)

2. Combine the leaves, sprouts, walnuts, pear and feta.

3. Season with a bit of oil (I used olive oil), salt and pepper. Mix well - make sure the sprouts and feta are spread through the salad (they like to clump up).

Enjoy!!

Let me know if you make this salad, or if you have any suggestions similar alternatives!

Apple Pancakes

We were coming back from a drive today and wondered about what we should eat when we get home, without having to go to the shops to buy extra ingredients. The idea of apple pancakes came up and I'd like to share with you the recipe that I came up with for them. I must say I was quite surprised with how tasty they ended up! Also, these are quite filling, so the amount I made would be enough I think for about four people..

Ingredients I used for pancakes:

about 750ml milk

4 eggs

organic unbleached plain flour

3 apples (we had red ones, I think they were the pink lady ones)

Cream:

Thickened cream (I used about 300 ml)

Vanilla extract

1. Using an electric mixer, mix the thickened cream and about a teaspoon of vanilla extract until it thickens nicely. 

2. Peel, core and dice the apples into small pieces.

3. Pour the milk into a separate bowl, add in the 4 eggs and add in the flour as you mix with the electric mixer. If you like, you could probably add some vanilla extract or essence into this mixture. Also, some people like to add a little bit of lemon juice (I think it's meant to make the pancakes a bit crispier), but I didn't have any on hand. 

Keep mixing and adding the flour until the mixture becomes quite thick and it slowly pours off the spoon. I found that when adding the flour I pointed the mixer handles towards myself (opposite to what's in the picture) the flour stayed more contained in the bowl.

4. Add the chopped apples and mix with a spoon.

5. Heat oil in a pan (on low to medium heat), then pour on some of the mixture. These pancakes will not be perfectly round (bit hard to shape them with the apple pieces) and they'll be quite thick.

6. When the edges become brown, flip the pancakes over, pat them down a little and fry the other side until brown.

7. Once fried, place the pancakes on some paper towel to absorb some of the oil. I recommend taking them off the pan before they get too dark, like the one below!

8. Serve with cream and jam. You should be able to see pieces of apples, which should still be a little crunchy.

Let me know if you make these - or how you alter the recipe!