Bread week is always an interesting episode - will it be a really specific technical, a well known but tricky recipe or something completely off the wall?
Well this year served up a treat - soft flour baps with veggie bean burgers. As a veggie myself I have been looking forward to see what this year's technical bakes were going to be and what, if anything I would need to change to vegetarianise the recipes. This technical recipe meant that I could simply follow the exact ingredients without any tweaks - perfect!
The rolls called for a slightly enriched dough using vegetable shortening and a little sugar. Otherwise the dough was a fairly straight-forward white bread recipe and the method was that of a "normal" bread. When it came time to make the buns the enjoyable part, as always, was the kneading - that magical process starting with a gloopy and slightly lumpy flour mix, ending in a stretchy, silky dough. Using a stand-mixer has become the standard in our kitchen, but every so
often it is so worthwhile taking the time to manually knead the dough - just a few minutes more to do this by hand - to feel the gradual change in the dough and really connect with what you are making.
I had the benefit of watching the episode before making the burgers, so I knew to flatten the buns after shaping them, however even with this information at hand I still managed to make baps that were smaller than my burgers - oops! As the burgers were made for dinner I also got impatient with the proving rolls, so they may have been a better size had I left them to puff up in their own time, rather than rushing them into the oven.
The burgers were delicious and may well become a regular staple. Their texture was satisfyingly substantial and owing to the pulsed beans and egg, they did not simply crumble as many veggie burgers do. The flavour was really good too, the beetroot gave an earthy background to the spices and the beans and with the addition of cheese (I used nutty emmental slices), relish and lettuce it really was one of the best veggie burgers I've had in a while! Being a bit of a child at heart I also enjoyed the process of making the patties, they were satisfyingly sticky, but retained their shape when pressed into metal rings (well, cookie cutters) and when fried and flipped.
They were even good the next day. What a treat.
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