Thursday, March 18, 2010

Apricots and Rolls


I worked my last scheduled nursing day yesterday. It's still unclear whether the merger has done away with my position, or if it's a temporary thing. There are plenty of other things to fill my days, so I am trusting all will work out for the best.

We did enjoy the sandwich rolls the other night. They were a little bit on the dense side, but I'm attributing that to the fact that I used more than half whole wheat flour in them, as I ran out of the unbleached white. I'll try them again with less whole wheat. I let the bread machine do all the initial work. This was a larger than usual recipe for the machine, but it managed with an additional couple sprinklings of water.


2c water

1 tbs sugar

1 tbs or packet active dry yeast

6c all-purpose flour

(cornmeal to sprinkle on baking sheet)


After first rise in the bread machine, I rolled out the dough to 3/4" thickness, and used a glass to cut out rolls. Sprinkle cornmeal on cookie sheet and place rolls on sheet. Let rise for a minimum of 20 mins, 1 hour if you can. Preheat oven to 475. Just before you pop them in the oven, brush rolls with cold water or beaten egg, and top with sesame or poppy seeds. Bake 15 mins.

Signs of spring continue to show themselves. The apricot has begun blooming. As of yet, there has never been any fruit, which has me doubting the self-fertile claim. But, it is a pretty sight, just the same.


2 comments:

phishlady said...

Our apricot trees have only borne fruit one year - the year my husband went out and touched all the flowers he could reach, moving the pollen around. It's in a fairly sheltered part of the yard, and our theory is that with very little wind and such an early bloom (almost no pollinators out), the pollen just doesn't get spread around as it should. Might be something to try this year...!

Laurie said...

Thanks, phishlady! I haven't ever tried that, & it would definitely be worth it to see. That makes perfect sense about the pollinators.