Garlic & Parm Milk Bread Rolls

perhaps the best bread I've ever made

Bread has never been my forte. Even in culinary school, I always felt one step behind when it came to the elusive balls of dough. My best friend Anna was the complete opposite, having a knack and intuition for it that I simply couldn’t replicate. HOWEVER. I am never one to let something keep me down, and after harassing my teachers over and over for their best tips and tricks- I slowly started to improve when I started practicing and practicing using the tips they gave me.

I would literally write everything down and refer to it while baking the bread so I could have the best outcome. As anal as it seems, I so desperately wanted to get the hang of it as soon as possible. It does get better but it does take practice. Dough to me is a living and breathing organism- one that you need to treat delicately and accordingly. The same recipe isn’t going to work at the exact same time due to a myriad of factors. Sometimes the humidity is higher, sometimes the surrounding environment microbes are different, sometimes the flour needs more hydration or less hydration, etc.

I got this recipe from Anna because her milk bread rolls are literally legendary. I knew I wanted to make them instead of regular dinner rolls because they are just that good.

They use a technique called tangzhong which is a water-based roux with milk and flour. The consequent gel-like mixture helps make the bread softer and fresher for longer since it pre-gelatinizes the flour starches. It also introduces that soft texture, making excess butter and fat unnecessary in milk bread. This then makes the dough much easier to work with as there isn’t a lot of fat making your life more difficult.

I really hope you guys try this out and enjoy it! The recipe is from Anna @annalpcooks

Ingredients:

Tangzhong

20g flour

27g water

60ml whole milk

Yeast mix

10g instant or active dry yeast

20ml luke-warm water

1 tsp sugar (if using active dry)

Dough

Tangzhong mix

Yeast mix

300g bread (strong) flour

80g all-purpose flour

60g sugar

1 tsp salt

130ml whole milk

1 large egg

1 tbsp softened unsalted butter

garlic butter

4 tbsp butter

2 cloves of finely minced garlic

2 tbsp grated parmesan

1 tbsp chopped parsley