Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Rose Buns


I have been kneading again. This time I made some rose buns! The idea is not entirely mine, I borrowed it from a blog called http://www.wendyinkk.blogspot.com





Gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous, that is all I could say about these buns. But the recipe calls for okinawan sweet potatoes which I could not find anywhere in Holland. I asked the shopkeeper at the Asian supermarket and all he did was laughed. So I was really not sure was he laughing because he doesn't have them in store or he doesn't know what it is?  I told him it is some purple colour sweet potatoes and he pointed at the the purple coloured "skin" potatoes. Indeed he was right they were purple but I told him I checked them, they are white inside I need purple. He doesn't have them in the store, so we both laughed (?!). So I have to improvise again doing just without and add coloring to get the pink tone. (I don't think I could try making my sister's haupia pie but I could always go to her and have some, in France if I were to drop by one day )http://i-lostinausten.blogspot.com/2012/05/okinawan-sweet-potato-haupia-pie.html








I made this plateau with some rossettes on it too. Yes it had some kneading involved. It is available at https://www.etsy.com/listing/100462178/rossette-plateau



Friday, May 18, 2012

Great Pizza Dough Recipe by DH Romania


I have been busy rolling, twisting, turning, moulding and lots of kneading.



These are some of the results of kneading, some silver clay pendants I made.









When my kids are hungry they prefer I knead some other kind of doughs for these.





I learnt this fantastic pizza dough recipe from DH Romania. I call her DH Romania although she is half German and grew up in Germany and lived here in The Netherlands half her life but her cooking is very much inspired by her grandmother in Romania. We were waiting for our boys to finish hockey and I found myself jotting down this recipe at the hockey field. Great ideas sometimes happened at the most unlikely places. It turned out to be the most successful pizza dough I have ever made. 


The recipe is so good my kids have to fight to cut the pizza, so I thought I made mini size pizzas that nobody has to cut or fight at the dinner table.



This dough is so easy to make and feels so good to touch and knead. The secret is actually making sure I introduce yeast to warm water together with sugar. After that the dough has to sit in a warm room temperature for few hours to proof into a fluffy, soft to touch texture. Its' size actually doubled. The dough is so soft , smooth and fluffy to manage. In  fact the fluffiest, softest and smoothest dough I ever touch.
As for the toppings I could get a bit lazier using ready made pasta sauce or just ketchup and finish it with some salami and grated cheese. Sometimes I just used leftover teriyaki chicken!
A great pizza dough!