Given today's rampant hoarding of hot dog buns, I thought it only prudent to try making my own. King Arthur Flour's Chicago-style bun recipe, pictured above and linked below, yielded Best of Show results.
While our flour supplies hold out, Nancy Leson and I are using our shelter in place time to bake. We've aired lots of baking shows over the years. Here are some of our favorite recipes from those shows.
I've never thought much of the tasteless, flimsy supermarket hot dog buns at the store. Leson likes the fancy-schmancy brioche buns. But for a hot dog? It's like putting a tuxedo on a gorilla. The King Arthur Chi-Styles were just right and easy to make. KA's New England style buns are the authentic carrier for shrimp or lobster rolls.
Nance liked Bread Illustrated's English Muffins with only one quibble. “Next time I'll let them rise for two days in the refrigerator for better Nook and Cranization,” she says.
Her favorite flatbread recipe is from the Zahav cookbook. And now she's discovered an even better way — to cook them — “on the hump.”
When I checked our Pottery Pizza Party show I was surprised that it's been more than two years. Seems like just a few months ago I was singing my eyebrows at those 1,200-degree kilns.
In our Great Bagel Bakeoff show, we put her one hour recipe up against my (superior) three-day method.
And for Thanksgiving dinner rolls, our favorite gravy sponges.
What to do when good bread goes stale? At Chez Leson, they toast it and throw it to the dogs.
“With bread all sorrows are less.” – Sancho Panza to his mule
