White bread rolls with sage & caramelized onions

How could I be afraid of something so beautiful? For the longest time, making bread has terrified me..you need to use yeast! you need to knead dough, you need science on your side! Inspired by some of my lovely fellow bloggers though I have finally triumphed over my fear of bread making & as it turns out…it’s not all that difficult.

All you really need is a warm place, a bit of time & 1 hungry boyfriend to feed it to.

The all the bread dough recipes I have read say to get rid of the seams if you roll them into balls for bread rolls but I really liked that they kind of pulled apart & got pieces of filling stuck in the gaps. I used an electric hand mixer to stir in the flour & kneaded the dough by hand but if you have one of those fancy shmancy kitchenaid type mixers with the dough hooks,  satellite TV & a spare tire…First of all I am very jealous of you & secondly I guess you could use that to do all the work for you too.

Ingredients:

• 1 tsp (15ml) active dried yeast
• 1/4 cup warm water
• 2 tbsp caramelized onions + extra(I just used the kind from a jar)
• 1 large bunch of sage chopped roughly
• 25g butter + extra
• 2 tsp salt
• 1 cup buttermilk  at room temp
• 6-8 cups strong white bread flour
• 1 cup skim milk at room temp
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 2 tbsp olive oil

Method:

1. Combine the water, yeast & 1 tbsp of sugar in a small bowl & leave in a warm place for 15 minutes until frothy.
2. In a small saucepan heat the butter & sage until butter is on the verge of colouring. Take off the heat.
3. Pour the milk into a large bowl. Add the remaining sugar, the butter, caramelized onions & salt.
4. Stir in yeast mixture then using an electric hand mixer add the sifted flour 1 cup at a time. My dough only took on about 6 cups of flour before it started to look dry so I stopped there.
5. Transfer your dough to a well floured surface & knead the dough until smooth & elasticy. You should be able to pull it in to big rubbery strands.
6. Put half the oil in the bottom of a large clean bowl, roll your dough into a ball & place in the bowl to proof. Cover with cling film & a tea towel & put in a warm place to double in size (about 2-3 hours)
7. When dough is nice & puffy, knock back the dough by punching it (good for frustration)
8. Preheat your oven to 190c. Oil a biscuit sheet with the remaining olive oil & shape into 10 even balls. Place evenly on the sheet, cover with cling film & a tea towel again & leave to rest for a further 20 mins.
9. Bake rolls for 10 minutes then remove from the oven & generously brush tops with  a mix of caramelized onion & melted butter.
10. Bake rolls for a further 20-25 minutes & have a lovely burnished colour.

I gotta tell you, everything they say about freshly baked bread is true. It’s heaven. These would be great with some parmesan grated into the dough or even diced sun dried tomatoes…hmm sun dried tomatoes. I think I want to make some of those!

I probably gobbled up 5 of these by myself, store the rest in the freezer as they’re only really good the day they’re made. I left mine out & well..I guess I’ll be making croutons out of mine.