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Breakfast Buns
2 yeast cakes 1/4 cup lukewarm water 2/3 cup sugar 2 cup scalded and cooled milk 7 1/2 cups sifted flour 1/2 cup shortening 2 eggs 1 teaspoon salt Dissolve yeast in lukewarm water, adding 2 tablespoons of the sugar. Now add the cooled milk, with 4 cups of flour to make the sponge. Beat 10 minutes, cover, let rise in warm place 1 hour. Add shortening, unbeaten eggs one at a time and beating after each addition. Add rest of sugar and flour to which salt has been added. Let rise till double in bulk. Shape with hands to medium-sized buns. Place in well greased pan, let rise 3/4 hour, and glaze with egg and water mixture. Bake in hot oven (450 degrees). Makes 2 dozen.
A sponge-method sweet dough of the kind Sunday breakfast books favored, mixed the night's-work way but written for a single morning. Two things need attention: the yeast measure and the oven.
- Yeast cakesTwo compressed cakes of the period are about 1.2 oz total, roughly equivalent to 2 envelopes (4 1/2 teaspoons) of active dry yeast. Instant yeast can stand in for the active dry, usually at slightly less weight, and stirred straight into the sponge flour.
- Lukewarm waterFor dissolving yeast this means 105-110F, no warmer. The sugar added with it is there to prove the yeast is alive; expect foam within 10 minutes.
- Scalded milkScalding was standard with raw milk; the usual explanation is that it denatures whey proteins that would otherwise weaken gluten, and it also dealt with stray bacteria. With pasteurized milk many bakers simply warm it to about 100F and proceed, though scalding does no harm.
- Flour by volumeSifted flour measures light: 7 1/2 cups sifted is roughly 1 3/4 to 2 lb (about 850 g), not the 2 1/4 lb you would get scooping unsifted. Hold back the last half cup and add it only if the dough is slack; enriched doughs should stay soft and slightly tacky.
- The oven figure450F is hot for a dough carrying 2/3 cup sugar, eggs and an egg glaze. Sugar and egg wash color fast at that heat, so the outsides can set dark before the centers are through. Many bakers would take enriched buns of this size at 375-400F; if you follow the original, watch them closely from the first few minutes and expect them done in well under 15.
- DonenessNo baking time is given. Medium buns of this size are done when deeply glazed and reading 190-195F in the center.
- Rising timesThe stated hour for the sponge and 3/4 hour for the shaped buns assume a warm kitchen. In a 68F room both stages will take noticeably longer; judge by the dough doubling and by shaped buns looking puffed and holding a slight dent when pressed.
- Shortening"Shortening" here could mean lard, butter or hydrogenated vegetable fat; vegetable shortening is a fair reading. Butter at the same weight gives better flavor. Have it soft, not melted, when it goes into the risen sponge.
- YieldTwo dozen buns from about 3 3/4 lb of dough, so roughly 2 1/2 oz each. A 9x13 pan holds about 15 with sides touching for soft-sided buns; use two pans, or space them on sheets for crisper edges.