Last Thursday, I held the last session of my fall seminar. The very last.
I won’t be returning to teach next year. That prospect feels, well, a bit sad but also a bit liberating. I’ve loved the students and the experience of exploring with them in the classroom. But it has been a task that I’ve perhaps been a bit too obsessive about, beginning as I have in early summer to line up resources, refine the sessions, and arrange for guests.
Shifts like path changes, refittings, alterations, prunings, accommodations, endings and beginnings—they are all part of a rich and fruitful life.
We nudge and change things all the time, I tell myself, so a shift of what seems routine can end up feeling like a flourish or a crucial comment scrawled in the margins of a longer narrative.
Take recipes, the ones written on paper, at least. They gather comments with each batch of rolls, sheet of cookies, or pot of stew. Sometimes, the pencilled scrawl reads “more time in oven” or “very good!” Other times, the instructions get a more drastic makeover, as in the case of the recipe I’ll share today for Laugenbrötchen, a delicious roll that Bond Girl Bride and I often ate with breakfast when we lived in Germany.
Our current recipe riffs on a recipe in a cookbook that returned with us to the United States (that recipe was a disappointment), a soft pretzel recipe we tried decades later, and then some refinements in the kitchen.1
That is, this Laugenbrötchen recipe scrolls a history and is a sort of palimpsest of tastes and kitchen tries. As a result, the “little breads” are delicious.
I’ve been able to bake them in well under an hour, from proofing the yeast to buttering a roll.
German Laugenbrötchen
INGREDIENTS
1.5 cups (350 ml) of warm water 1 packet of yeast or 2.5 teaspoons (12 ml) of instant yeast 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of brown sugar (we use Splenda light brown sugar) 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of softened butter 1 teaspoon (5 ml) of salt 3 and 3/4 cups (450 g) of all-purpose flour (we use King Arthur flour) Some coarsely ground salt for sprinkling on the rolls One-half cup (120 ml) of baking soda
DIRECTIONS
The dough
Mix the yeast, salt, and brown sugar into the warm water.
While the yeast proofs, preheat the oven to 400F (200C), cover a baking sheet with parchment paper, and heat two quarts of water and the baking soda in a large pan for the baking soda “bath.” Find a slotted ladle or, in a pinch, a large spoon to use for dipping the rolls into the soda bath.
Once the yeast has proofed, add the softened butter and add the flour, cup by cup while mixing. I use a dough hook on a mixer, but you can use a spoon to mix as well. For the last three-quarters cup or so of flour, mix until the dough firms up and isn’t sticky. If it stays sticky, go ahead and add some more (say, a quarter cup) of flour. You want to be able to poke it and have the dough bounce back a bit.
Put the dough on a floured surface and knead it. Since I use the mixer, I knead for a couple of minutes, but if you mix by hand, give it about five minutes. Then form the dough into a ball, and smash it down into a flattened circle, just enough to help you divide into individual portions for the rolls (that is, the Brötchen, “little breads”). I find that a three- or four-inch thick round works. (Thinner than that and you might as well make pizza!)
You can choose to make a dozen small Brötchen or eight larger ones. I’ve found that eight is easier; a dozen of them of equal size is harder to manage.
Cut the dough into eighths (or twelfths, if you do a dozen). Roll each section into a ball. This sometimes is tricky because the part of the dough exposed by the cut tends to be stickier than the outside of the ball. Do your best.
The soda bath and baking
The soda bath will be boiling by the time you need it. You stick the rolls into the bath only for about 30 seconds. I do two rolls at a time, and about 10-15 seconds in, I use the ladle to flip the rolls over. If a roll stays in the bath more than 30 seconds, it might begin to taste a little “metallic” (but this isn’t a disaster). Take out the rolls and place them on the parchment papered baking sheet. Sprinkle some coarse ground salt on them. Repeat until you’ve got all of the rolls suitably bathed and salted.
Using a very sharp knife (I’ve used both serated and straight blades successfully), cut an “X” on each roll. You’ll notice that the rolls have a skin. You cut through that skin. I usually cut about one-quarter (6 mm) inch deep.
You can put the rolls into the oven right away, though I like to let them rise for a few minutes. Not too long a wait, since the rolls will expand a bit in the oven as well. A little rise helps make the rolls a bit lighter.
Let them bake for 12-15 minutes. Once they have a nice brown color, pull them out and put them on a cooling rack.
You’ll find it hard to wait until they cool to eat, so I say, go ahead and indulge!
