Home › Sunday Morning Breakfasts › Vienna Roll Mixture
Vienna Roll Mixture
1 yeast cake 1/2 cup lukewarm water 2 cups scalded milk 6 cups flour 1 egg 1/4 cup melted shortening 1 teaspoon salt 2 tablespoons sugar When the milk is lukewarm add the yeast cake, dissolved in 1/2 cup lukewarm water, and 3 cups of flour; beat the mixture from 5 to 10 minutes, until very smooth and light. Cover; set aside in a temperature of 84 degrees F. When light and puffy add the egg well beaten, melted shortening, salt and sugar, and work in slowly three cups flour. Turn onto molding board, using remainder of flour as needed, and knead for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the dough ceases to stick and is smooth and elastic to touch. Cover and set aside until double in bulk.
A sponge-and-dough sweet roll base, written to end at the first rise because the shaping and baking are handled by the roll recipes that follow it in the book. Everything here is workable today with a few substitutions.
- Yeast cakeOne yeast cake is a 0.6 oz cube of compressed fresh yeast. Substitute one 1/4 oz packet (2 1/4 teaspoons) of active dry yeast, dissolved in the lukewarm water as directed.
- Scalded milkScalding was traditionally held to deactivate enzymes in raw milk that weaken gluten. Pasteurized milk does not require it, but heating does dissolve the sugar and speeds warming; either way it must cool to lukewarm (about 105F) before the yeast goes in, since milk much hotter than that will kill the yeast.
- 84 degrees FThe specified rising temperature is warmer than most kitchens. A turned-off oven with the light on, or a proofing box, holds it. At a cooler 70F the sponge simply takes longer, perhaps twice as long.
- ShorteningIn this period shortening usually meant lard or a hydrogenated vegetable fat. Butter works and tastes better; melt it and let it cool so it does not scald the yeast.
- Flour and hydrationSix cups scooped flour is roughly 1 lb 14 oz. Hold back the last cup: the dough should be soft and slightly tacky, and adding all of it blindly gives a dry, tight roll.
- Kneading timeFifteen to twenty minutes is right by hand for a dough this size. In a stand mixer with a dough hook, 8 to 10 minutes on medium-low reaches the same smooth, elastic stage.
- What the recipe leaves outThere are no shaping, proofing or baking directions here. Shaped rolls of this type proof until nearly doubled, then bake at 400F for 15 to 20 minutes until deep gold and hollow-sounding.
- YieldThe batch makes about two dozen rolls of ordinary breakfast size, or two loaves.