Went a bit mental with the flour
To save some money here and there on lunches I decided to make some soup. Jamie Oliver’s tomato soup recipe is simple, easy and delicious! I made a huge batch of it, enough to last the whole week with some left over for the boyfriend. After a couple of days of soup without the accompaniment of bread I started to get a little bored and craved it a bit. To continue my money-saving streak I had a quick sift through my cupboards and decided I had everything I needed to make some bread.
I got out my trusty bread recipe book that I bought a couple of months ago and had a look at recipes that might go with my soup. I decided on a simple bread recipe to go with my simple soup, lovely fluffy breakfast rolls or ‘baps’ as they are known in Scotland. They are really easy to make and went perfectly with the tomato soup. As always, I added a couple of things to the recipe to change it up a bit, here are my ingredients:
- 500g strong white bread flour
- 150g melted butter
- 5 g dried yeast
- 2 tsp salt
- 3 tsp black pepper
- bunch of basil leaves, chopped
I added the black pepper and basil to the recipe, mostly because my basil plant looked like it wanted to be used and I thought the black pepper would compliment the tomato soup. I was really stringent with the method this time. I left the dough to rise and re-rise for as long as possible and pre-heated the oven well in advance. The recipe suggested the rolls would take 20-25 minutes to cook but mine took 35 minutes, I think this is due to my rubbish oven rather than the recipe being inaccurate. I also had the oven turned up high for the first 10 minutes to crisp up the top.
The result? I was extremely happy with my bread rolls, they had the best texture out of any of the breads I’ve made so far this year. They were extremely fluffy, not dense at all. Having the oven up high for the first 10 minutes of cooking meant I had a lovely, golden, crusty tops to my baps. Another tip to perfect this is to sprinkle a bit of cold water on the dough when you first put it in the oven. I was really happy with my addition of basil and pepper, especially the pepper as it worked really well when you spread the bread with butter and dipped in the soup.
Breakfast Rolls with Black Pepper & Basil
I had a bread roll with my soup for the rest of the week and saved loads of money! This recipe proves that bread doesn’t have to be complicated to be perfect. This simple recipe was the best attempt at baking bread so far and I think my strictness with the method, rising times and oven temperature really made a difference.
What is your favourite kind of bread to serve with soup? Let me know in the comment section below, I’d love to hear from you 🙂
charliesays 