I've been baking rye bread since early 2008, and relatively quickly I started using sourdough. The reason was simple: I couldn't get anything like what I was looking for in Ballarat. But we've been buying white bread for some time, even though it's clear that Australian bread doesn't really match our tastes. It has become increasingly difficult to find bread that we like, so I decided to try making white bread rolls myself. This is the result of the the first attempt.

The intention is to be able to bake rolls quickly. It takes me 2 days to prepare a loaf of bread for baking, much of it involved in increasing the quantities. For the rolls I'm aiming for 250 g of flour, which should be enough for 4 rolls, so I make a sourdough from 500 g of flour and 500 g water and divide it into 4 portions: use one, put the others in the fridge. When I'm down to only one portion of sourdough, I can expand it back to 500 g and repeat the cycle.

Sourdough

Ingredients

quantity		ingredient		step
250 g		Old sourdough		1
375 g		Wheat flour		1
375 g		Water		1

Preparation

Mix the ingredients well, keep warm for 24 hours or so. Divide into 4 portions. Keep the unused portions in the refrigerator.

Rolls

quantity		ingredient		step
250 g		Sourdough (above)		1
125 g		Wheat flour		1
35 g		Water		1
5 g		Salt		1
		Milk		2
		Sesame seeds		2

These proportions correspond to 250 g of wheat and 160 g of water, a ratio of 1:0.64.

Preparation

1. Knead sourdough, wheat, water and salt together, allow to rise in a warm place.

2. Knead again, divide into 4 rolls of 100 g each. Allow to rise again, brush with milk, sprinkle with sesame seeds, bake in an oven at 225° for 15 minutes.