Making Burger Buns from Scratch - Wheat Bread Recipe

In my quest to make our food from simple unprocessed ingredients, I baked up some buns for black bean burgers.  I wanted more of an sandwich thin like the inspiring Guilty Kitchen picture, but I wound up with more of a traditional bun.

 

I used a recipe from the Joy of Cooking.  I have the 1962 edition - I found it for a dollar at a thrift store.  It's great and I am told the 60-70's editions are better if you are looking for recipes that don't call for processed ingredients. 

I used the Whole Grain Bread recipe as a base.  I can't leave a recipe alone.  I always wind up adapting it to what I have on hand. This time I had just made chicken stock.  The stock had chilled over night in the fridge and I needed to defat it. 

When stock is cold the fat is solid.  The image on the right shows the stock with the solid fat chunks I was working on skimming out. Jeff says this picture looks like a toliet bowl. Um yeah, stock is not very photogenic.

I used the chicken fat in place of butter.  These rolls are meant to be savory and so I thought the flavor might even add something.  Turns out I can't really taste the chicken at all but the texture turned out great, nice and soft.  Now I have another use for the grease I keep saving in jars.  It's good stuff, don't throw it away!
 
Wheat Burger Buns
 
Ingredients
1/4 cup milk
1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
1/8 cup chicken fat heated to liquid
1 cup warm water
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 tablespoons wheat gluten
4 cups wheat flour
4 cups unbleached white flour
 
Step 1: In a small sauce pan on low, heat the milk until it is warm to the touch.  In a large bowl mix the sugar into the milk and then sprinkle the yeast on top.  Let the yeast sit five minutes to proof. 
 
Step 2: To the yeast mixture add the fat, water, salt and egg.   Slowly stir in the wheat gluton and wheat flour.  Then mix in the white flour. 
 
Step 3:  Turn out the dough and knead for five minutes.  Try to add as little flour as possible.  A pastry scraper may come in handy if the dough is really sticky when you start out.  (I don't have a pastry scraper so I just use a metal spatula.) 
 
Step 4:  Place the dough in a greased bowl and allow it rise until double, about 1 1/2 hours. 
 
Step 5: Punch down the dough and then divide it in half. I made half of the dough into a loaf and put it in a greased bread pan and the other half into six buns. You could make all the dough into buns if you wanted. I shaped the remainder of the dough into flat biscuits with my hands - about the same size as the burger patties. In hindsight I should have made them slightly smaller because they rose a little bit. Place the patties on a greased cookie sheet and preheat the oven to 375F degrees.  
 
Step 6:  Bake the rolls for 15-25 minutes or until they are golden brown.  Then let them cool on a rack so they don't get soggy bottoms.  I let the loaf to rise for about 45 minutes before baking it.  I wanted the buns to be denser so they wouldn't fall apart when eating the burger.  However, I wanted the loaf of bread to be lighter.  The bread loaf took about 45 minutes to bake.   

Nutrition:  The buns come out at 325 calories, 3 grams of fat and 2 grams of fiber for WW point value of 6. These are very big buns.  If I mad them again I would divide the dough into 8th instead of 6th and get a slightly lower point value.

Verdict? The buns were delicious with the black bean burgers.  We ate the burgers with some lettuce, jack cheese, salsa and plain Greek Yogurt on top.

Tonight we are going to have the loaf of bread with some Squash/Carrot/Sweat Potato Ginger Soup.  I'm working on improving this recipe.  I'll get a post about the improved soup up soon.  Stay tuned.