Honey Sourdough Dinner Rolls

This recipe is an adaptation off the Super Soft Sourdough Rolls recipe from The Perfect Loaf. If you're interested in sourdough and haven't checked out this site, I highly recommend it.

The first time I made The Perfect Loaf's rolls, I followed the recipe pretty closely. We have a family friend who harvested one acre of organic turkey red wheat just east of Boulder and so I wanted to incorporate his flour and make the rolls a bit more wholesome. That led to the first edit, which was to replace all the "bread flour" in the recipe with our local wholewheat turkey red flour.tablespoon

I've noticed this local flour is a bit thirstier than other flours I've used, and I did have to add about 20g of extra water during the mixing phase to get the dough to come together with the proper hydration.

The second edit I made was to replace all the castor sugar with honey. I simply prefer the taste of honey and think it goes perfectly with these rolls. In order to account for the extra water content in honey (~15-18%) I adjusted the water weights down proportionally.

There are a lot of steps to these rolls, but they are actually quite easy to make, especially if you work from home like I do and enjoy an excuse to get up and take a 5 minute break every so often.

Recipe

Ingredients

Levain

• 74g Central Milling Organic Baker's Plus flour
• 72g water
• 15g honey
• 30g sourdough starter

Tangzhong

• 41g fresh turkey red wholewheat flour
• 166g whole milk

Dough

• 328g Central Milling Organic Baker's Plus flour
• 148g fresh turkey red wholewheat flour
• 40g honey
• 195g water
• 11g salt
• 95g unsalted butter

Egg Wash

• 1 egg
• 1 tablespoon whole milk

The Bake

• 12" cast iron skillet
• Extra butter to grease pan
• Olive oil to greze pan

Instructions

1. Mix Levain (Day one at 9pm)
   • Mix the "Levain" ingredients listed above in a jar and let it sit overnight with the lid on, but not tightened
2. Cook Tangzhong (Day two at 8am)
   • Cook the "Tangzhong" ingredients listed above on medium heat until they form a paste. Set aside to cool
3. Cut Butter (Day two at 8:15am)
   • Cut the butter into 1/2 chunks and set out to come to room temperature
4. Mix (Day two at 10am)
   • To a mixing bowl add all "Dough" ingredients to a mixing bowl, except the butter, along with the tangzhong.
   • Mix on speed 1 for a minute with a dough hook until the ingredients come together
   • Mix on speed 4 for 5 minutes
   • Let dough rest for 10 minutes (pull it off the dough hook)
   • Turn the mixer on to speed 1 and add the butter one chunk at a time
   • Cover the bowl with a towel and let sit
5. Bulk fermentation (Day two from 10:30am-2pm)
   • Let the dough rest for 30 minutes
   • Then do three sets of stretch and folds spaced 30 minutes apart
   • Let the dough rest covered and untouched for the remaining 2 hours
6. Chill dough (Day two from 2pm-2:15pm)
   • Throw the dough in the fridge for 15 minutes to make shaping easier
7. Shape (Day two from 2:15pm-2:45pm)
   • Butter the cast iron skillet generously with cold butter
   • To ensure the dough doesn't stick, I also add about a tablespoon of olive oil to the pan on top of the butter
   • Cut the dough into ~85g balls (I always lose some weight to moisture due to the climate I live in), shape them into balls, the arrange them in the skillet
8. Proof (Day two 2:45pm-5:15pm)
   • Cover the dough with a plastic bag (make sure it's full of air) and let it proof
9. Preheat oven (Day two at 4:45pm)
   • Preheat the oven to 425°F
10. Bake (Day two at 5:15pm)
    • Whisk together the egg and milk listed in the "Egg Wash" ingredients
    • Gently brush the egg wash onto the top of the risen dough balls in the skillet
    • Sprinkle sea salt on the top of each dough ball
    • Bake 20 minutes at 425°F
    • Spin the skillet 180 degrees and cover lightly with a sheet of tinfoil. Then turn the heat down to 350°F and bake 25 minutes.
    • Remove the block of rolls from the skillet and let cool for 10 minutes. I usually flip the skillet upsidedown and run cold water over it to help it cool. Take care not to get the inside wet as we'll put the roll back in and still need the grease.
    • Return the rolls to the skillet and serve!