Bread for the Masses

While I love to make yeast bread, I don't usually have time with a rambunctious 3 year old on my hands. When I get around to thinking about dinner, there's not enough time to let the dough rise and bake and I usually end up just sending poor husband out to the store for a loaf of french bread or something similar.

A serendipitous find came to me over the Christmas holidays...2 recipes for yeast breads that require little or no time to raise! The first is one of the tastiest rolls I've ever eaten, let alone made myself. I had them whipped up and baked by the time I had finished the soup I made to go with them. They were so good Dana didn't want to eat anything but the rolls!

The second recipe is for no rise pizza crust. I was skeptical at first, but it turned out the best pizza dough I've made at home and I didn't have to do much more than mix it up and put it on the pan. Easy peasy!

Recipe #1
Batter Rolls (total time to make: about 1 hour)

3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup very warm water (no hotter than 115 degrees)
2 packages dry yeast (or 2 tablespoons)
1 egg
3 and 1/2 cups all purpose flour

-Place milk in a microwave safe bowl and microwave until hot--about 2 minutes.
-Stir in the sugar, salt and butter and set aside.
-Measure the warm water in a large mixing bowl and stir in yeast.
-Let the yeast stand for a few minutes until foamy.
-Add the milk mixture (should be lukewarm) the egg and 2 cups of the flour.
-Beat until smooth
-Stir in enough remaining flour to make a soft dough.
-Cover with plastic wrap and a towel and set in a warm place until doubled--about 30 minutes.
-Punch down the dough.
-Shape into 20 rolls. (I only got 18, but I like mine bigger)
-Place rolls in a lightly greased 9x13 pan or jelly roll pan. Cover again and let raise about 30 minutes (as above).
-In the meantime preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
-Bake rolls 15 minutes or until lightly browned.

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Tips From Mrs. McMitchell:
These rolls are easy to incorporate into your dinner routine! Here's how I fit them in:

I mixed up the dough and set it aside to rise while I made a pot of Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup. The rolls were done with their first rise by the time the soup was simmering, so while the soup did it's thing, I shaped the rolls and put them in the pan for their second rise and I covered them with the same piece of plastic wrap I used on the bowl and left them to rise.

While they were rising I added the noodles to the soup and preheated the oven. Just as the soup was finishing up the rolls were ready and they only took 10 minutes until they were brown. Dinner was completely homemade and ready to go in an hour!

Recipe #2
No Rise Pizza Crust (total time to make: about 25 minutes)

1 package yeast (or 1 tablespoon)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup warm water
2 and 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 teaspoon salt

-Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
-Combine the yeast, sugar and warm water. Stir until dissolved.
-Add remaining ingredients and mix well. Knead dough a couple of times to mix in all the flour.
-Let rest 5 minutes. (I let it sit while I cut up my pizza toppings.)
-Roll out into the size and shape you need. (I have used the same recipe on a jelly roll pan and on round baking stones)
-Add toppings of your choice.
-Bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown.

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Tips:
-You can add dried herbs to the dough if you like. Italian seasoning blend is always nice to add to the dough. I think garlic powder would be really good too!
-We made really good cheesy breadsticks with this the other night too: Put about 1/4 cup olive oil or butter in a saucepan with 3 or 4 cloves of finely minced garlic. Heat until the oil for a few minutes to release the garlic flavor and let cool until warm. Once the dough is in the pan cut it into sticks with a pizza cutter. Brush with the garlic oil and sprinkle with parmesan or mozzarella (or both) or whatever kind of cheese you like. You can add a little sprinkle of dried parsley or Italian seasoning on top if you like. Bake and enjoy!
-This dough is really good with half whole wheat flour and half white flour.
Use your imagination. This dough is really hard to mess up!