\n
Bridge rolls are usually associated with social gatherings of one sort or another: one theory as to the origin of the name is that they were made for consumption at bridge parties, where these small, soft rolls would provide sustenance without getting in the way of serious card-playing. This sounds eminently plausible, if you remember that another, better known, bread snack was named for (though not invented by) the inveterate card-player John Montagu – the 4th Earl of Sandwich. At least, that’s how the popular story goes.<\/p>\n
Bridge rolls are made with a dough enriched with butter, milk and egg, and have a characteristically smooth, slightly shiny crust, the crumb soft and chewy. They certainly do make perfect finger food. Chopped egg and cress, prawn cocktail, and Coronation chicken are ideal fillings, making the Bridge roll a very southern-English sort of delicacy.
\n<\/p>\n
I opted to make Lilliputian buns rather than the more traditional finger roll, by way of an experiment. These are just a couple of inches across and gone in a few mouthfuls. I used the recipe from Linda Collister’s The Bread Book<\/em>, though I halved the quantities:<\/p>\n 340g strong white flour You can rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips, but I don’t bother. I just combine everything and let the action of kneading take care of incorporating the fat. Do make sure it’s fairly well diced first, though, or you’re likely to end up with a greasy mess on your hands. Work the dough for 10 minutes and leave it to bulk ferment until doubled in size. This should take longer than for a ‘lean’ dough containing only flour and water, as the fat and sugar have a retarding effect on fermentation. About an hour-and-a-half to two hours is probably about right<\/p>\n Once the dough has risen, divide it into pieces – how many will depend on how large or small you want your rolls. I divide my dough by weight, which is a lot less hassle than it sounds. Use a dough scraper to cut pieces of dough off and allow about 50g for regular-size buns or rolls. Once you get into the swing of it, you’ll find you can divide the dough quite quickly. If the portion is oversize, cut a sliver off; if its short of a few grams, add a bit.<\/p>\n Shaping your rolls is also quicker and easier than you might think. To make a bun, simply cup your palm over the top of each piece and press down gently while rotating it. You should feel the dough adhering to the worksurface slightly and resisting the movement. That’s what you’re aiming for: this resistance coupled with the circling motion of your hand will pull the dough into a neat ball. Once shaped, place it on a baking sheet and flatten it slightly with your palm.<\/p>\n If you want the more traditional finger-roll shape, follow the same procedure as above to form a ball, but then roll it back and forth a few times to elongate it.<\/p>\n Allow a few centimetres between each roll on the baking sheet; it doesn’t matter too much if they merge during baking as you can gently tear them apart once cool. Cover with floured tea towels and leave to prove until roughly doubled in size, then brush each roll with a little milk. Bake in an oven pre-heated to 230\u00b0c for five minutes. Then turn the heat down to 200\u00b0c and give them another ten minutes or so. I always cover cooling bread with a tea towel anyway, but it’s particularly important that you do so with these rolls in order to keep the crusts soft.<\/p>\n It’s not the right time of year for tea on the lawn, and I haven’t been doing much entertaining lately, but I can see these working the winter season with a sliver of gravadlax and a shot of good vodka…<\/p>\n Bridge rolls are usually associated with social gatherings of one sort or another: one theory as to the origin of the name is that they were made for consumption at bridge parties, where these small, soft rolls would provide sustenance without getting in the way of serious card-playing. This sounds eminently plausible, if you remember read more…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3367,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564\/revisions\/3367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flourandwater.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n200g milk
\n7g salt
\n15g fresh yeast\/7g fast action or easy blend
\n30g butter, diced
\n2 tsp sugar
\n1 small egg, lightly beaten<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"