About a month and a half ago, when I was finally, tentatively exploring the freedom granted by rolled-back restrictions, I found myself in Indigo looking for a gift card for Ricky’s birthday. I can’t go into a bookstore and not look around, and while I was wandering through the magazine nook I saw an issue of Pioneer Woman magazine. Because I’m a good daughter, I bought it for my mom. Because I’m not a great daughter, I wound up reading it before she got a chance. Most of her recipes feature too much meat for my liking, but there, nestled in the middle, was a triad of recipes for savoury buns including these beauties.
Be still my heart! Unlike everyone else on the planet, I didn’t drop into hardcore baking mode last spring, but these looked too good to pass up. I hadn’t worked with a yeasted dough in forever, and this seemed like as good a time as any to get back into it. And with time off work over Easter, it felt like a great time.
The first thing I did was toast my sesame seeds over low heat. It started out feeling a bit like a zen garden as I continually moved them around the pan to ensure even toasting, but became decidedly less zen as I became impatient and increased the heat approximately every 75 seconds to speed it along. Miraculously, they didn’t burn, but developed a beautiful golden slightly-less-pallid colour.
My everything-bagel seasoning, all mixed and ready to go. Those huge patches of black are poppy seed, and not pepper (just in case you thought I liked living on the edge).
Once I made my dough and spread it with cream cheese and sprinkled it with about half my mix, it was time to roll these up and slice them. The one way I deviated from the recipe was to use my trusty 9″ x 13″ Wilton cake pan and not a 9″ pie pan as recommended. The pictures accompanying the recipe showed squished, stunted buns. (No pictures of the process, sorry; my hands were covered in flour and dough and cream cheese and I wasn’t about to start smearing that on my phone.) The tops got brushed with melted butter and sprinkled with the remaining seasoning mixture. Because I wanted these for breakfast and not a late-afternoon snack, I stopped at this point to cover my pan with plastic wrap and stick the whole works in the fridge rather than let them have their rise.
The next morning, I pulled them out of the fridge, removed the plastic wrap, and set them in a low oven with a cake pan of water for steam, until they looked like this. It was quite the relief to see them rise and puff up like that, because when I started making the dough the day before I had panicked that I had killed my yeast due to a difference in opinion of what constitutes “lukewarm”. It looks like I dodged a bullet, because these filled out beautifully.
Baked juuuust until golden. You can see how they expanded even more!
These were so good! The dough was tender yet sturdy enough to hold the buns together, and the cream cheese and everything-bagel seasoning complimented each other perfectly. I probably could have scarfed the entire pan by myself, but instead I shared them and everyone who tried one had only good things to say. Although they’re marvy hot out of the oven, they’re just as good at room temperature – which isn’t something I can always say about cinnamon buns.
Now I think my next project will be the spinach and feta variation. It must be healthy if there’s spinach in it, right?
Thanks for looking! 🙂
The Witty Child 