Monsters and Spoon Rolls

The monster was stirring.  I could feel it happening.  It had been 5 days since the monster’s hunger was fed, it needed to feed again!  Driving home from work, I could feel the urge building and building.  But there was nothing to feed the monster, what was I going to do to calm it down?   I didn’t have time to stop and buy what it needed.  So I surpressed the monster until finally it burst forth in a frenzy!  Thank goodness I had made it to BJs in time to pick up 20 pounds of King Arthur all purpose flour because the BAKING MONSTER was lose again!  LOL. 

As I’ve said in previous blogs I go down to Waneta’s and Wayne’s condo, my neighbor’s a few doors down, on Saturday mornings for breakfast.  We have a great time chatting and laughing about the week’s events.  This morning Waneta handed me her latest copy of a magazine called Cappers.  It was open to an article on Homemade Bread the Easy Way by Jean Picard.  Waneta knew I would want to read it since it was about the no-knead method of breadmaking that I use. 

Pointing to the fourth page of the article and a recipe entitled Quick and Easy Spoon Rolls, she explained they had had them awhile back and really grew to love them.  I read the recipe and it was very simple, and in fact reminded me of another recipe that I call “Duffy’s Blender Bread”.   Duffy is a gal I call my Alaska mom.  She in her 90’s now and still doing well.  She has the usual problems of folks in their 90s but a great gal!  She has all kinds of great recipes and her quick and easy blender bread is one of my favorites. I'll go over that one in a later blog post.   But I will say that after making the spoon rolls, Duffy’s Blender Bread is not as wet and sticky and the Spoon rolls are. 

Anyhow, Waneta and I chatted some more and then got back to the spoon bread rolls.  I knew what was coming when I told her it would be a good recipe for her to make.  I saw the look on her face and waited for it to come out of her mouth.  Wait for it, wait for it…”well, I think it’s a good for Ezzie to try for me!”  I laughed and told her I KNEW she was going to say that.  And of course she was right.  I had to try the recipe…for her.  LOL. 

The recipe called for the following ingredients:

3 ¾ packed cups unbleached all-purpose flour

¼ c sugar

2 ¼ tsp instant yeast (or use 1 package)

1 ¼ tsp salt

2 c water

½ c unsalted butter

1 large egg

Into a large bowl I put the dry ingredients, then melted the butter and let it cool, then added it to the warm water.  The recipe says to heat them together on the stove until the water and butter mixture reaches between 120 and 130.  I actually got it a bit too warm, so I sat it outside on the porch for a few minutes in the 30 degree weather.  That cooled it down quickly! 

Next I beat the egg, just a bit, then mixed the liquids in with the dry ingredients.   Once blended I covered with plastic wrap sprayed with Pam and set aside to rise.  As you can see from the picture below it is a very wet and sticky dough.  

My kitchen is pretty cold so it took about and hour to double in size instead of the 35-40 minutes stated in the recipe. 

Once it is doubled in size, stir the dough down, and fill well-greased muffin cups 3/4 full.  Let the dough rise again until it’s risen to the tops of the cups.  Now the recipe says to leave them uncovered during this part of the rise.  I did for part of the time.  I think it’s not a problem to leave it uncovered for the entire 20-30 minutes it takes to rise in the muffin cups because the dough is still very wet. 

During the last 15 minutes of the rise heat the oven to 400 degrees. 

Bake 20 minutes or until they are golden brown.  I must say they round up beautifully!  Once out of the oven, wait five minutes before you remove them from the muffin pans. 

I took them down to Wayne and Waneta and they were thrilled.  Even though they had just eaten dinner, they had to sit down and have a roll each. 

The roll is like a cross between a muffin texture and a roll.  It has the big holes characteristic of the no knead breads, but the butter in it gives it a real softness. 

I told Waneta that it’s definitely a recipe she can do.  “Yeah, I could.  But I like it when you make them Ezzie!”   We all laughed.  I told her I’ll keep making them for her!  

One final word from Waneta.  "Mardel, you need to try this!"