Sourdough Italian Buns

The Bread Baking Babes are making Hamburger Buns. And we will have them too, I thought. But, I wasn't paying attention enough. I made nice Sourdough Italian Buns and not the Hamburger Buns the Babes made. Next month I will follow the recipe and join the BBB as a Buddy. 

I used this dough before, I made Sourdough Italian Rolls. They are delicious. At first I thought of making my buns with nigella seed, but during the process I made these nice buns; plain with a cross and others with white sesame seed on top.

We loved these shaped as Rolls and we love them shaped as Buns. That evening Peter made some great Hamburgers; filled with fried onions and delicious herbs. Even dough I didn't joined them, thanks to the Babes we had a nice dinner with home made hamburgers and buns.

Yield: 1050 g (I made 8 buns of 130 g each)

This is what I used: 

Biga Naturale Ingredients:
64 g mature 100%-hydration sourdough starter 
256 g flour 
192 g water 

Final Dough Ingredients:
320 g flour 
170 g water 
3.1 g instant yeast 
11.7 g salt 
14 g sugar 
4.8 g roasted malt powder 
14 g olive oil 
All of the biga naturale 

This is what I did:
In a bowl, combine the biga naturale ingredients. Cover and ferment overnight (about 8 hours) at room temperature. I let it ferment for more than 12 hours, because it was time to go to bed. 

Mix with dough hook, combine all of the final dough ingredients. Mix in low speed until combined. Adjust the water as needed to achieve a soft dough consistency. My dough was sticky and I didn’t use all the water. But with the folding the dough came together beautiful. 

Continue mixing in medium speed to a low-medium level of gluten development. 

Transfer the dough to a lightly oiled container. Cover and ferment for 1.5 hours, with folds after 5, 20 and 40 minutes. During the first two folds I needed a little bit of flour, because it was too sticky. After two folds the dough became soft and smooth. 

Turn the dough into a lightly floured counter. Divide into 130-gram pieces for buns. Pre shape the dough pieces into balls and let rest, covered, for 10 minutes. 
Shape the dough into balls. Place the buns, seam-side-down, on flour dusted parchment. I spayed some buns with a bit of water and sprinkled white sesame seed over them. 

Proof, covered, for 40 minutes at room temperature, or until they have increased in bulk by 50%.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven, with baking stone, to 260˚C. You will also need steam during the initial phase of baking, so prepare for this now. Just before baking, I slashed some buns with a cross. 

Once the loaves are in the oven, reduce the temperature to 230˚C. Bake for 8 minutes with steam, and another 10 – 20 minutes or so without steam, until the crust is golden brown. 

Cool on a wire rack. Filled with a delicious hamburger, Peter made for us, we had a nice dinner. 

I found this recipe on WildYeast ;the blog where you find more than Bread recipes.
I send these buns to Yeastspotting and to BYOB