Burger Buns from the Aga

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In December 2012 I posted about making white buns, but nowadays I am using another recipe, inspired by the one published by the people of King Arthur Flour. In this recipe an egg is added, and no milk is used. They taste marvelous!

Ingredients:
- 400 g wheat flour
- 35 g sugar

- 1 large egg

- 25 g butter

- 6 g salt

- 6 g dry yeast

- 200 g water
- some melted butter for brushing the buns 

Method:

Mix the flour, sugar, salt and dry yeast using a whisk. Add the egg, the water and the soft butter and mix well in a mixing bowl, using a rubber spatula. When the dough is going to form a ball, transfer it to your working surface and start kneading it for at least 15 minutes. I prefer the Bertinet method: I wrote about this way of kneading in my previous posts about baking bread.

When the dough is ready (stick your finger in the dough, lift it and when it is falling down after a few seconds without leaving any dough sticking to your finger, it's ready), transfer it to a clean bowl, cover it with plastic and let it proof for an hour or so. It has to double in volume, when it is not very warm in your kitchen, put the bowl on a rack on the warming plate.

After this take out the dough and transfer it to the working surface, which has been dusted with some flour, flatten the dough with your both hands and form a thick sausage, which you cut in 8 pieces, all weighing about 80 g. Use your dough scraper for this, or a sharp knife. Let the pieces rest for about 10 minutes.

Now flatten the pieces again, and fold the outsides in, forming a ball with sufficient tense on the surface of the dough. Roll them with your hand and place them seam down on a baking tin, covered with baking paper, a few centimeters apart.

Cover them with plastic again and let them proof until have doubled in size (about an hour or more, if necessary on a rack on the warming plate).

When the buns are ready for baking, remove the plastic, brush the tops with melted butter and bake them in the roasting oven, half high. Create steam by putting a baking tin on the floor of the oven and pouring a glass of hot water in it. Bake for about 10 minutes and transfer the buns to the baking oven for another 5 to 10 minutes. Brush the tops again with some melted butter.

So now we have perfect buns for making hamburgers... I will let you know how I make them, inspired by Cristina Lorenzo, who posted on her great blog Kanela y Limón the recipe for a perfect burger (La Hamburguesa Perfecta).

Ingredients:
- 500 g ground beef
- 1 tablespoon chopped parsley
- 1 clove garlic (crushed)
- 2 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
- salt, pepper and some paprika to your taste

Mix the ingredients well and form 4 burgers, bake them and build the perfect 'hamburguesa':

1. some lettuce
2. a slice of tomato
3. some onion rings
4. the burger
5. a slice of cheese (cheddar!)
6. some bacon
7. tomato ketchup
And for me: some mayonnaise.....

Klik hier om het recept van de broodjes in het Nederlands te lezen.

Königsberger Klopse (German meatballs from Königsberg)

Meatballs are a very popular dish in Holland, but we always roast or actually sear the meatballs, before we let them simmer in liquid until done. Klopse are only boiled in stock. I didn't like the idea, but when Meeta Wolff (What's for Lunch, Honey?) published this recipe, while she generally doesn't like cooked meat, I decided to give it try. I am so happy I did! These meatballs taste delicious and the sauce completes this dish in a wonderful way.
Königsberger Klopse are an old Prussian speciality which exists over 200 years. Königsberg used to be a German seaport city in East Prussia, but now the city is renamed Kaliningrad by the Russians and is a Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea.
Thanking Meeta for her original recipe, I adjusted the recipe a little so it turned out AGA-proof.

Ingredients for the meatballs:
- 500 g ground beef
- a bread roll
- some milk for soaking the bread
- a large egg
- 4 to 6 anchovies, chopped in small pieces
- 2 onions, finely chopped
- some butter
- a bunch of parsley, finely chopped
- zest of a small lemon
- 500 ml beef stock
- pepper, salt, nutmeg

Method:
Tear the bread roll into pieces and soak in milk until soft. In the meanwhile, melt some butter in a small skillet and fry the chopped onion on the simmering plate until tender. Mix the onions, the egg, the soaked and pressed bread, the anchovies, parsley and zest with the meat. Add salt, pepper and ground nutmeg to taste. Use both your hands for this and take your time.
Bring the stock almost to boil in a large pan on the simmering plate and form small meatballs (about 15) which you gently put one by one in the simmering stock. Turn them carefully after 2 or 3 minutes and prevent the stock from boiling. Close the pan and transfer to the cooking oven for about half an hour. When ready, take the meatballs out and keep warm (or let them cool down in case you prepare the meatballs a day before making the sauce). Strain the stock and reserve it for the sauce.

Ingredients for the sauce:
- 30 g butter
- 30 g flour
- the strained stock
- 3 tablespoons capers (incl. the liquid)
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 125 ml sour cream
-  a small glass dry white wine
- 2 egg yolks
- pepper, salt (some sugar)

Method:
Melt the butter in a large pot on the simmering plate until bustling. Add the flour and stir well. Let the flour simmer until golden: the flour must be well done. Now add the (hot) strained stock and keep stirring until the mixture is smooth (you won't need all the stock for this). Let it cook for a few minutes. Add the capers, lemon juice, cream and wine. Stir until the sauce is boiling again. Season to taste with salt, pepper and perhaps a little sugar.
Now take your pot from the simmering plate and whisk the lightly beaten egg yolks into the sauce. Add the meatballs, mix them with the sauce and transfer the pot with a lid on it to the cooking oven for half an hour. Because the sauce will be ruined when coming to boil, the cooking oven is the best place for heating the meatballs through. In case the meatballs are cold because you made them the day before, keep them for an hour or more in the oven.
Serve with boiled potatoes or with (AGA-baked!) bread.
Guten Appetit!

Klik hier om dit recept in het Nederlands te lezen.

Tarte à l'Oignon (French onion tart)

I think I was only 12 or 13 years old when my parents took my sister and me on a holiday to Alsace in France. We stayed in the picturesque little town Riquewihr, famous for its old houses from the 16th and 17th centuries. And for the Riesling, a very tasteful white wine which is produced in Alsace. I remember that one morning we were invited by friends of my father and they offered us a large piece of delicious onion tart. Accompanied by a large glass of the best (and first!) Riesling I ever had. At 11 in the morning!
I found the recipe of the genuine Tarte à l'Oignon on the internet: Recettes Alsaciennes at alsace-vins.net. As usual I transformed the original recipe to an Aga-proof one.

This recipe is based on puff pastry. And because I dislike the deep frozen ready to use puff pastry you can buy in the supermarket, I always prepare some myself. Not the difficult way, but so-called rough puff pastry. This is how I do it:

 Ingredients:

- 250 g wheat flour

- 250 g cold salted butter

- 125 g ice cold water

- 4 g salt

Method:

Mix the flour with the salt and mix in the butter, which has been cut in small cubes (let the butter become ice cold for this: put it in the freezer for half an hour or so). I use my KitchenAid for this. What a perfect machine that is! When the mass is transformed to a substance that looks like bread crumb, you can add the water and transform it into a ball of dough. Don't knead it! Wrap it in plastic and put it in the fridge for at least half an hour. If it has not cooled down enough you can put it in the freezer for a while.

Put your dough on a lightly floured working surface and roll it out to a 10 x 30 cm rectangle. Fold the end which is closest to you over the dough for one third and fold the other end over it. Now you end up with a perfect(!) square. Turn the dough 90 degrees and repeat this process. Don't expect that this is an easy job! The dough will become better to handle later on...

Wrap your dough in plastic again and put it back in the fridge for at least half an hour.

Once the pastry has rested follow the rolling and folding process again; after half an hour in the fridge the pastry is ready for use. Now the moment has come to make your tart.

Ingredients:
- 600 g sliced onions
- 250 g bacon lardons
- 60 g salted butter
- 60 g flour
- 400 g cold milk
- 2 egg yolks
- salt, pepper, ground nutmeg

Method:
Bake the bacon lardons on the simmering plate for about 10 minutes and take the lardons out of the baking pan. Use the grease for baking the onions, slowly: they must not color, for also about 10 minutes. Mix the bacon and the onions and keep them warm on the warming plate. Now prepare a bechamel sauce: melt the butter on the simmering plate and when the butter is boiling add the flour. Stir well and let the mixture simmer for 5 or 10 minutes. Now add all the milk in one time and stir, stir, stir, until the sauce is cooking. Let it cook for some time until a thick and lumb free sauce forms. Keep stirring all the time. bring to taste with salt, pepper and nutmeg and transfer the sauce to your working surface. Now first incorporate the egg yolks and after that the baked onions and the bacon.
Now put the puff pastry in a 24 cm spring form pan (greased and floured) and line bottom and sides. Fill the pastry with the bechamel/onion/bacon mixture and let it bake in the baking oven for at least an hour.
Bon appetit!

Klik hier om dit recept in het Nederlands te lezen.