Bath buns

Right - these are top notch.
I followed the Richard Bertinet recipe - and it took me overnight, and 6+ hours in the making. But this one is worth it.
The cakes are very very light, plain - in the best way - because the bread is just gorgeous. Just a sweet bun.

 

First you make a 'ferment' which i had to leave overnight, as i didn't have time to finish the process for the buns yesterday evening. I wasn't sure it would still work, so only made a small batch of buns - but it worked well. I made a judgement on the structure of the ferment which looked very well bubbled - but it wasn't frothy as it was at its height of fermenting. 

So this morning I started making the dough with the ferment, milk, sugar, yeast, flour. Worked the dough from very very sticky to very elastic. This took about 20 minutes as I had quite a lot of ferment (only half of what i'd made as I wasn't sure it was going to work and didn't want to waste even more flour). 

Working the dough was very enjoyable, watching the dough change very gradually and getting into a good rhythm. 

Then it was the proving cycle. One hour, then refold and another hour. Then section and make buns and prove for 2.5 hours. 

Glaze the buns with milk and sugar glaze. 

Then bake for just 20 mins!

Glaze again for a good sticky bun. 

Then eat in 5 minutes because they're so good. 

This is one of the best things i've ever made. Very happy with these - although you do have to mimic being a proper baker for a day - its a full on job.