Baguette rolls

We wanted to make some banh mi sandwiches the other day, but we were pretty low on any sorts of food stuffs.  Luckily, we're masters of cleaning-out-the-fridge sorts of meals, and ended up with a damn tasty sandwich.  I believe we had oyster mushrooms, cilantro, yellow pepper and some sort of spicy mayo on the sandwiches, and we made the bread relatively quickly. Total success. But, the bigger success was that I figured out a method (finally!) to get my bread to crust up like a proper baguette.  

I've noticed that the NYT no-knead bread has pretty much the awesomest crust ever, as well as the proper amount of holes on the inside.  I knew that given the short rise time and lazy knead time meant no big holes, but if we could just get a good crust... that might make it worthwhile.  The advantage of that NYT bread is that it's cooked in a dutch oven, so the steam from the dough itself makes a little steam bath for the bread inside of the dutch oven. So, I figured I'd try making my whole oven into a steam bath.  I started things at 500F, and then dropped the heat to 350, to properly cook the insides once the crust had done it's thing, and boy was this ever a success.  Try it for yourself - totally worth it!

Baguette Rolls

Start by making your bread dough. About 2C of warm water, a spoonful of sugar, a spoonful of yeast. Add flour until it's paste-like, then add a spoonful of salt.  Maybe a splash of olive oil.  Add more flour until the dough is at a knead-able consistency. Knead for 5 minutes or so.

Go for a run.  (I believe in this case the rise time was ~1:15).

Come back, wash your hands (yes, you, you know you've been snot rocketing while running), and divide the dough into whatever size rolls you want. Put them into whatever shape you feel like. Preheat the oven to 500F, and put a pan full of water on the bottom shelf. Let that preheat and steam for 20min or so.  Then cut some gashes (crosses, slices, whatever, score the top) into each roll, put them on a pan (maybe grease the pan first, or put down cornmeal or something), and stick the rolls into the oven.

Cook at 500 for 10min or so, then without opening the oven, drop the heat to 350ish, and cook another 20-30min.  They're done when the bottom makes a hollow noise when you knock on it. They may look done sooner, since the tops will be golden brown and delicious thanks to the steam earlier than the insides are cooked, but go with the knocking test.  

Enjoy!