Brioche Rolls

Oh, my writing has been rather weak lately, not to say feeble. Across the board. Unfortunately, time has been short since the holidays, because things are happening… Although, you know, when things are happening, you can’t complain.

On the other hand, when things are happening, my back often aches, so that makes the fun even more intense 😉

But as you can see, I am writing something, so let me explain. About a week ago, perhaps a little less, I was driving to work and something nudged me. A finger—I don’t know whether it was necessarily divine—but it touched me and a word popped into my head. A word beginning with b, as it happens. Brioche. And that brioche just wouldn’t leave me alone (perhaps because of my 3-day stay in Paris before going to Barcelona—and France’s decisive victory over Spain in aesthetic experiences, at least comparing those two cities), so I decided to make some.

The task was made easier because I had booked a weekend with Ninja at my parents’, and as you already know, my parents have a wonderful, utterly primitive American KitchenAid machine, which makes preparing any dough, especially yeast dough… positively primitive in its simplicity.

So voilà. Here is the recipe for the most wonderful brioches in Poland 🙂 Oh, they are wonderful. The initial plan was to eat them with fruit preserve, but they turned out so good, so fragrant, so fluffy, so amazing on their own that they disappeared just as they were 🙂 I recommend them!

PLEASE NOTE!

Most importantly, if you want fresh brioche for breakfast, you need to start the evening before and get up early in the morning. After coming out of the fridge (the dough spends the night there, as explained below), it still needs 2 – 3 hours to rise before baking. So if you get up at 6, you will be enjoying brioche at 9 🙂 An ideal idea for a late weekend breakfast.

Recipe details:

Preparation time: 2 days (including about an hour on the first day and 2 hours on the second); start the evening before baking

Baking time: 20 minutes

Baking temperature: 180 degrees Celsius

Tips: a KitchenAid or another capable food mixer for kneading dough is useful

Serves: several

Calories: hehehe, briohehe

Ingredients for outstanding buttery French brioches:

• half a kilogram of wheat flour
• 8 grams (a sachet) of instant yeast
• a scant glass of milk
• a glass of icing sugar
• 200 grams (a block) of butter 
• 3 hen’s eggs
• a pinch of salt
• 1 hen’s egg yolk (for brushing before baking)

Brioche recipe:

I poured the milk into a medium-sized saucepan and warmed it gently on the gas hob (it should simply be warm, neither too cold nor too hot). I added the yeast, a tablespoon of flour and a tablespoon of icing sugar. I mixed thoroughly and waited. Make sure the saucepan is not too small, because this yeast starter rises quite a lot and may overflow.

After roughly 15 minutes, I put the flour, icing sugar and salt into the KitchenAid’s steel bowl. I mixed everything with an ordinary spoon, poured in the milk-and-yeast starter and stirred. I fitted the bowl into the KitchenAid and mixed with the beater, first at medium speed and then faster, for roughly 10 minutes.

Next I added 3 hen’s eggs and mixed for roughly another 5 minutes. Then I replaced the beater with the dough hook and added the butter, cut into pieces, to the already mixed dough. I mixed everything with the hook for about 10 minutes (changing speeds: slowly at first, then a little faster, and briefly at the highest speed). The result is a rich, smooth, uniform dough.

I covered the prepared dough with a lid (it comes with the machine; you can just as well use cling film) and put it in the fridge to rest overnight. I went to bed myself 😉

In the morning, I took the dough out of the fridge, kneaded it lightly, covered it with a cloth and left it on a board to rise (it may be a little sticky, so dust the board lightly with flour). After roughly an hour, I prepared two baking tins (shown in the photos), lining them with baking paper.

I lightly kneaded the dough by hand again and cut it into roughly 18 pieces. I shaped them into balls (they did not all turn out quite the same size) and placed them in the tins (not too close together, as the dough will rise). I covered them with a cloth and left them to rise. After roughly 1.5 hours, I preheated the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

I put one hen’s egg yolk into a small bowl and added two tablespoons of cold milk. I beat them together and brushed the tops of my now-risen rolls. I put them into the preheated oven. After 20 minutes, the beautifully golden brioches can be taken out and left to cool. They taste wonderful as soon as they have cooled a little, but you can happily eat them for a day or two as well. On their own, with milk or with fruit preserve. They are delicious 🙂 Ready. Enjoy!

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