Fresh olive & rosemary rolls

I haven’t baked bread in a long, long time, and it was long overdue! Nothing beats fresh, home-made bread, right? On Friday I made green olive and rosemary rolls, and the smell of the bread cooking managed to sneak around the entire flat, which definitely got the salivary glands working overtime.

Bread is such a great bake to share with friends and family, and, let’s face it, who doesn’t like fresh bread?

Ingredients:

• 500g bread flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1tbsp sugar
• 7g yeast (or 1 dried yeast sachet)
• 350ml warm water
• Extra flour for dusting (I used plain)
• 1 egg, beaten
  (Optional):
• 100g pitted olives
• tbsp dried rosemary

Pre-second prove

Post-second prove

Post egg wash

Post bake

Method:
(Makes 8 large rolls)

1. Dissolve your yeast in the warm water, and stir in the sugar.
2. After adding your bread flour and salt to a bowl and (if you want) making a little well, pour in the yeast-water-sugar mixture.
3. Knead for 10 minutes if using a mixer, or for 15 minutes if kneading by hand, as I did.
4. Put the dough in a bowl and cover with a damp tea towel. Leave to prove at room temperature for approximately 1 hour, or until doubled in size. (1 hour was enough for my dough.)
5. Knock back the air from the dough, then, at this point, add any fillings to flavour your bread by folding them in, best using your hands or a dough hook on a mixer. I used green olives and rosemary, but you can get as fancy or as simple as you want. That’s the beauty of a basic bread mixture, the additions are totally up to you.
6. Shape your dough into what you want the final result to look like. Remember, tuck and roll!
7. Place on a floured baking tray and cover with a damp tea towel, leaving for a second prove for approximately 30-45 minutes. (I left mine for 45.)
8. After the second prove, egg wash your bread rolls (or whatever fancy shapes you’ve got creative with) and pop them into the oven at 200C fan.
   Top tip: place a tray of water at the bottom of your oven while it’s pre-heating. This will create steam in the oven, which will create a beautiful crust on your bread 🙂
9. After 35-45 minutes (depending on your oven strength and bread size) take out your beautifully golden rolls, and tuck in! Best served fresh from the oven, with a slathering of butter (come on, you’ve just gone to the effort of making your own bread, you can allow yourself an obscene amount of butter this time).

Pre-mixing

Pre-first prove

Post-first prove

adding the flavours