Everything Buns

A lot of my foods are inspired by other foods. Sometimes the inspiration is so far removed from the original dish that you'd need a roadmap, a GPS and a bloodhound to find your way back. These buns are a little closer to their inspiration - bagels loaded with toppings.

The buns aren't chewy like bagels - that wasn't the point. I wanted to mimic some of the flavors. Some. Not quite all. I limited the seeds to sesame and poppy on top, and anise seeds in the dough. And dried toasted onions in the dough. These buns are definitely on the savory end of the bread continuum.

I made burger-sized buns because I wanted to use them for sandwiches. Of course you could make them smaller and use them for dinner rolls. Divide them into 12 pieces instead of 8 for generous rolls, or 16 pieces for smaller rolls.

One of the best things about baking bread is the glorious smell wafting from the oven as it bakes. The toasted onion made itself known during baking, but was much more subtle in the finished product.

I used brown sesame seeds for these buns, but white or toasted sesame seeds are just fine.

Everything Buns

1 cup lukewarm water
2 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
2 1/2 cups (11 1/4 ounces) bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon anise seeds
2 tablespoons dried toasted onion
1/4 cup powdered milk
2 tablespoons butter, softened
eggwash (1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water)
1 tablespoon sesame seeds (or more as needed)
1 tablespoon poppy seeds (or more as needed)

Combine the water, yeast, and sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer while you gather the rest of the ingredients. Add the bread flour, salt, anise seeds, toasted onion, and powdered milk. Knead with the dough hook until the dough is elastic. It won't be completely smooth because the onions will be bumpy. The dough should be a little bit soft, but not sticky. Add the butter and continue kneading until it is completely incorporated.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and set aside until the dough has doubled in size, about an hour.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and preheat the oven to 350 degrees with the rack in the center.

When your dough has risen, flour your work surface and turn out the dough. Divide it into 8 pieces, form each piece into a ball, then flatten the balls into disks about 1 inch high. Place the dough disks onto the prepared baking sheet and cover with plastic wrap. Set aside until doubled in size, about 30 minutes.

When the dough has doubled, brush it with the eggwash, then sprinkle with the sesame and poppy seeds. Use more or less, as you desire.

Bake at 350 degrees until nicely browned, about 30 minutes.

Remove the buns to a rack to cool.

Did you see the cool GIVEAWAY I've got? Check it out! 

This has been submitted to Yeastspotting.

Embarking on the second thousand

Woah! This blog just passed the 1000-post milestone. One. Thousand. Posts. 1k. Lotsa lotsa many many. Whole lotta posts.

If those post were only 500 words each, that's a half-million words. And I'm willing to bet that most were WELL over 500 words. No wonder I wore out the e-key on my laptop!

When I started this blog, I wondered if I'd have enough to say to sustain regular posting. Well, it turns out that I like to blab. A lot. Some days, I've had so much going on that I posted twice.

And sometimes I'm so scatterbrained that I've accidentally posted twice. Oops.

But either way, the post earlier today was #1000, and now I'm embarking on the second thousand.

So, let's celebrate, shall we?  And what better way to celebrate than with a gift? No, not for me. For you. I've got one of these to give away:

Pretty, isn't it? It's a soapstone pizza stone in a metal carrying ring made by All Clad

And it includes the pizza cutter as well. Besides baking on the stone, you can chill it and use to to serve cold foods. You want one, don't you?

I did a review of a whole bunch of pizza stones for Serious Eats, and this was one I reviewed and I really liked. Here's my review of this one. And here's the roundup of the whole bunch of them.

When the nice folks at All Clad shipped the baking stone to me to review, they accidentally shipped two. I contacted them and asked what I should do with the second one. "Whatever you like," they said. So I boxed it up and waited for a good time to give it away.

The celebration of 1000 posts seems like a good time. Right?

Yeah, I thought so, too.

How to enter:

• To enter to win, leave a comment on this post. Whatever you like.That's your Official Mandatory Entry. One little comment. Easy peasy.

But wait! There's more! Since this is a big milestone for me, let's make it a bit more interesting, shall we?

• Go to THIS POST. You will see a list of bloggers (me included) who are making Fabio's recipes. For additional entries, go to as many of those blogs as you like, comment on their Fabio recipe, then come back here and tell me which blog you commented on. Those Fabio posts will be going up all week, so be sure to post on the correct recipe! Leave ONE COMMENT HERE FOR EACH ENTRY. If you leave one comment that says you commented on three other blogs, that only counts as one entry.

There we go! One mandatory entry, and a whopping TEN possible extra entries. 

Contest begins the second this posts and ends on Monday, June 25 at midnight mountain time. Open to continental US residents only. Sorry, but this thing is REALLY heavy, and it's gonna cost enough to ship within the US.

BUT WAIT! STOP THE PRESSES!!! 
My friends at Marx Foods have sweetened the pot a bit. There will be a SECOND winner, and that person will receive 1/4 pound of vanilla beans from Marx Foods. If you've never tried fresh vanilla beans (instead of the crunchy stale ones that you often find at grocery stores) you need to try them! I've used vanilla beans from Marx, and they're AWESOME!

No additional hoops to jump through for entry - just one additional prize!

Good luck!

Fabio's Fabulous Flank Steak

This week Virtual Potluck is partnering with Bertolli Olive Oil to help promote their Where Flavor Comes From Summer Grilling campaign.

Here's where you'll find the complete list of participating bloggers.

As part of the campaign we were given exclusive grilling recipes from Top Chef’s Fabio Viviani and we've got information to share about the Let’s Cook Summer Sweepstakes.

The Let’s Cook Summer Sweepstakes (launched June 15) is a Facebook-based sweepstakes that celebrates the tastes of summer and offers prizes to help at-home cooks discover where flavor comes from.

The Grand Prize is a trip for four to Los Angeles for a one-on-one cooking lesson with Chef Fabio Viviani, or $5,000 for a kitchen makeover. Not bad, eh?

But that's not all! (Sorry, I've seen a few too many infomercials lately.) There are other prizes like Bertolli Olive Oils and Bialetti cookware. The Let’s Cook Summer Sweepstake is hosted on Facebook at Facebook.com/Bertolli.

WhereFlavorComesFrom.com is a brand new site dedicated to summer grilling. You can download the free Let’s Cook! app, available for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch, with more than five hours of exclusive step-by-step cooking videos with Chef Fabio Viviani.

Let the grilling begin.

I chose a flank steak recipe, because I knew I had flank steak on hand. Or I thought I did. It was actually skirt steak. That's easy substitution. Skirt steak is a little thinner and more ragged-looking, but just like flank steak, the grain of the meat runs lengthwise. Flap meat is similar, but I don't see that very often in stores.

Since I substituted the meat, I figured I'd better make the rest of the recipe exactly as written. I was a little ... surprised by the combination of pineapple and basil in a salsa with jalapeno. It just sounded odd. I wouldn't have batted an eye if it was cilantro. But basil?

But I carried on, and I was quite surprised. It was really good. Even more surprising, the leftover salsa was great the next day - I sort of expected the basil to do something weird, but it was just fine. If anything, the salsa was a little spicier, probably because the heat of the jalapeno had a chance to permeate the rest of the ingredients.

The last time I bought jalapenos, they were pretty tame. This time, they packed a little heat. You never know with peppers; they can surprise you. We like spice, so we were both happy that these peppers had a little more personality.

As far as the steak, brushing it with oil before grilling means that you don't need to oil the grill, which can be an interesting endeavor. Let's just say that flames can happen. Brushing the steak serves the same purpose, with less drama.

Flank Steak with Pineapple Salsa
Recipe by Chef Fabio Viviani
4 servings
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes

1 1/2 cups chopped fresh pineapple
1 medium red bell pepper, chopped
6 green onions, thinly sliced
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely chopped
Juice from 1/2 lime
1/4 cup thinly sliced fresh basil leaves
Pinch salt
1 lb. flank steak
1 Tbsp. Bertolli® Classico Olive Oil
  
Combine pineapple, red pepper, green onions, jalapeno pepper, lime juice, basil and salt in medium bowl; set aside.

Brush beef with Bertollli Classico Olive Oil. Season beef, if desired, with salt and black pepper. Grill, turning once, 10 minutes or until desired doneness. Serve with pineapple salsa.

Disclaimers and stuff:

Thanks to Bertolli for sponsoring Virtual Potluck's work with this campaign. I received products and payment for participating. As always, my opinions are my own.

About Bertolli Olive Oil: Sold in more than 40 countries worldwide, Bertolli Olive Oil has been providing consistent flavor and superior quality for nearly 150 years. As the number one olive oil brand worldwide, Bertolli Olive Oil’s three distinct varieties—Extra Virgin, Classico and Extra Light Tasting—will enhance the flavor of your favorite foods.

About the sweepstakes: No purchase is necessary to enter Bertolli's sweepstakes on Facebook. Entries will be accepted from June 15, 2012 at 12:00 a.m. EST – September 6, 2012, at 11:59 p.m. EST.  Limit one (1) entry per person, per day, per e-mail address.

Virtual Potluck is not part of the sweepstakes. Commenting here does not enter you in the contest. Go to Facebook. Enter. Win. Have fun! 

On the other hand, I love comments ;-) Let's talk grilling, shall we? What's your favorite thing to grill?