ITALIAN SAUSAGE STUFFING & PARKER HOUSE ROLLS
Anytime of year?
Hi everyone! A moment of gratitude for your support! I’m so happy you’re all enjoying the Thanksgiving info. The goal is to get your creative juices flowing–use these recipes to inspire you to create your own dishes or make these ones at home. The cooking community is vital to me–so I’m hoping to contribute by getting more people into it. I wouldn’t be able to get through many things in life and definitely in the food world without a little help from my friends.
PARKER HOUSE ROLLS WITH HONEY BUTTER
Brioche takes a bit of practice to shape, but I promise the dough itself is quite easy to work with. Seriously! This is a take on a Thomas Keller recipe that I absolutely love. What’s great about this recipe is its versatility—you can easily tweak it and transform it into so many other delicious things. I’ve used variations of this dough for cinnamon rolls, maple donuts, cranberry bread, and more.
The key to making your brioche look photogenic lies in the rolling process. That step can be incredibly relaxing and a perfect escape during the hectic holiday season. Stay tuned—we’ll be posting a video next week that walks you through the entire dough-making process.
For the Dough:
Mise out all of your ingredients separately. This extremely helpful (especially when baking) instead of measuring things out as you go.
Using a stand mixer, start with your yeast and flour in the mixing bowl. Use the dough hook to incorporate the yeast into the flour on low mixing for one minute.
Add all of your ingredients (EXCEPT for your cubed butter) one by one to the mixing bowl. Mix for a total of five (5) minutes. During this step, I stop the mixer once at the 2.5 minute mark to scrape down the sides and the dough hook so that all ingredients get evenly distributed and nothing sticks to the bottom of the bowl.
Then while on medium speed drop your butter in, one cube at a time until it is all incorporated. Do this slowly! It will help your brioche become nice and smooth.
Mix all together for about 12 minutes on medium low speed. You are essentially mimicking the effect of physically kneading the dough–so don’t put your mixer on hyperdrive.
Using a plastic bench scraper–remove dough from your mixing bowl and into a lightly floured bowl. Allow the dough to rest for about 1–1.5 hours at room temperature to kick-start the fermentation process.
After 1.5 hours, I fold the dough onto itself two times continuing to shape the mass into a ball.
Cover with plastic and leave in the refrigerator overnight. Use a bowl that is 3x the size as the dough with grow a little bit while fermenting.
THE NEXT DAY: Set up a baking tray with parchment in the size you’re baking in. I then use baking spray liberally to coat the baking surface. I recommended dividing the dough in 50g balls before rolling them into boules (french for ball :)). I roll them right onto a wooden cutting board with a quick spray of vegetable spray on my hands and the board. You can practice first with one hand, or like our friend Lionel below, you can get good enough to use 2! The trick is to cup your hand and move in a rapid circular motion until the top of the boule appears smooth. Don’t give up if it doesn’t happen right away.
Whisk two (2) eggs with a fork and set aside.
Preheat oven to 350°F (176°C).
Once portioned, position the boules with enough space to proof to 2x the size at room temperature. Lightly brush them with the egg wash. If your room is dry–I like to cover them with a big, domed lid so when they proof they remain untouched. Sometimes when the room is too dry–dough can start to dry out–its happened to the best of us. Be careful and keep an eye on it.
Once proofed, the dough will be shoulder to shoulder in your pan. Using a pastry brush, lightly brush on egg wash. You can add sesame seeds or maldon salt on top at this stage. I usually whisk one egg with a tiny splash of water as my egg wash to get that nice caramel color.
Bake for 20-30 minutes.
ITALIAN SAUSAGE STUFFING WITH APPLE & MAPLE
This stuffing is a crowd pleaser. I highly recommend. Our spin on stuffing includes pecorino cheese. Yes, pecorino cheese. That’s crazy you might say but I am a little crazy, so?
A flavor-add for making a great stuffing is to pick the right breads. There are many incredible combinations for this. I like using sourdough and Hawaiian rolls for the sweet and savory combination. I tear the Hawaiian rolls in big messy pieces and then cut the sourdough into cubes. I like the different textures and it begins to feel like a savory bread pudding which I enjoy. You can tear and cut the bread the day before making the stuffing to allow it to dry out on a sheet tray. If you are using fresh bread the day you are making the stuffing, tear and cut it then place it in a 350°F (176°C) oven for about 12 minutes to dry it out a little.
Place a medium pot or dutch oven over medium heat. Add butter and olive oil followed by the onion, celery, and fennel. Add about 17g / 2 tbl of salt and let this cook for about 15 minutes.