Throughout the week, I continued searching for places that would have easy bread/dough recipes. I came across Caroline’s website: “Caroline’s Easy Baking Lessons” , and I spent some time rummaging through her recipes. She has lessons divvied up into Savoury, Sweet, Fondant (@MrsBruce4th – this may be great for your cake decorating venture), and a few other options. Her lessons are structured so that you start with the simplest and easy for beginners, and then you build on these skills in the subsequent recipes. I wonder if she’s a teacher? She clearly knows how scaffolding works. 😊. I learned a lot from Caroline, but I decided not to use any of her recipes. Nothing was really speaking to me. I did, however, bookmark her website for the future. I think this is the most informative, useful website I’ve come across thus far.
I kept on my way.
I wanted to venture into flavours and savoury breads/buns. I was really feeling garlic bread or buns of some sort. I went onto Instagram and searched for #homemadebuns #quickgarlicbuns. I came across some videos, but they weren’t really tutorials and were far too quick for me to follow along. I liked this one , and I saved it for later to try. I went onto TikTok and found this one, but again, it was way too quick AND it required store-bought pizza dough instead of homemade. I bookmarked it as well to try at a later date because I really like the idea of store-bought pizza dough. What a timesaver!
I went to Pinterest and here’s where I found this one. I was going to try it mainly because it had “30-minutes” in the recipe. BUT, I wanted to really challenge myself with a different way to shape dough. I decided to save that one as well because it does look incredible.
Onward I went, and here is my winner winner chicken dinner: Sam’s recipe for Homemade Garlic Knots.
“These homemade Garlic Knots are made completely from scratch in just over an hour! My recipe is easy (no mixer needed) and makes perfectly chewy, buttery, and garlicky knots. Includes a how-to video!”
I think I’ve officially realized the importance of reading the entire recipe from start to finish; plus, I watched the video a couple of times to get myself started. Sam’s recipe was super easy to follow all the way through. I like that she added garlic powder to the actual dough. Truth be told: I doubled what she had in the recipe. It just felt right. I know I should have stuck exactly to the recipe, but this is the cooker vs baker in me. Mamma Val rarely measures when cooking, so I felt her voice telling me to add a bit more. This is a savoury dough, so we’re basically cooking, right?!
Here’s a some pics of the process:
18 Inches ready to get knotty.
The final rise before the oven.
Golden Knots
Perfectly golden.
Comments from my judges:
“These are your best ones.”
“Can I have all of these in a bowl?”
“Holy cow these are unreal!”
“Mom. I love these.”
***IMPORTANT: the recipe calls for a brushing of garlic butter and basil. Due to my children’s adverse reaction to anything green sprinkled on top, I omitted the green stuff.***
My kids hate green spices.
MY THOUGHTS:
This is the best recipe I have found online. Sam is right when she says, “Today’s recipe is super simple”.
The Queen agrees.
Her timeline was right on par. FYI: I started this recipe at 8:30am and was completely finished by 9:45am. (Oh, and they were devoured and all gone by 10:15 am). Nothing like a good ol’ garlic knot for second breakfast. Her ingredients were simple. Recipe was easy to follow. No kitchen aid needed. Video was awesome. She also mentions how to make this dough in advance or freeze it. But honestly, this recipe came together so quickly that I don’t think I would need to unless I had a lot of time on my hands and wanted to freeze batches for busy times. Summertime sounds like a great time to do that!
These would be great dipped in some marinara sauce. I also feel confident enough to add a few things to the dough if I wanted to make more interesting. Bacon? Cheese? Chives? Parm? Ham? Cracked black better and feta? The options are endless. I will be talking to Mamma Val about options for this recipe to make it our own. Also, this recipe is kid-friendly. My two younger ones really like to help me in the kitchen, and this is so simple and easy to follow that next time I make these I will enlist their help. This leads me to my last point: next time I make these, I will double the recipe. These were gobbled up so fast that more is always the answer.
MORE. MORE. MORE.
Maybe this recipe felt easiest because I’m getting more confident working with yeast and dough. I guess this learning project is doing its intended purpose.
Well played, Katia.
Overall, this recipe gets 5 doughballs/5.
Laura, these look amazing! I can see why your kids devoured them. I have enjoyed reading your blog. I think that this is a recipe that I might have to try.
Thanks, Andrea. You should try the focaccia recipe I made, too. They’re both incredible.