Playing with the dough : Sweet Bunny Rolls

I love Yeast Dough and I love to Bake so it's no big surprise that I love to bake this little Bunny's for all the Kids in the Family.

They are delicious alone or cut open and spread with homemade strawberry jam.

As you can see on the Pictures its pretty easy and I promise you everybody will love them. I will even send them to YeastSpotting, they are just to cute that I just need to share.

You don't have to make them into Bunny's you can do what ever you want. 

Even a little Owl is possible

Give it a try and tell me what you made.

Sweet Bunny Rolls

3 cup flour

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2 1/4 tsp. instant yeast

1/2 cup softened butter

1/2 cup + 2 T lukewarm milk

1/2 cup yogurt cheese or quark

1 egg, separated

raisins and coarse sugar for decoration

Mix the flour, sugar, salt and instant yeast in a bowl.

If you use a mixer please use the  dough hook if not a large spoon is fine.

Mix the milk, butter and Cheese/Quark into the flour.

Knead 1-2 minutes, form into a ball, cover and let rise for one hour.

The dough will not double and you should not panic. It’s very rich and so it will only rise a little.

You can even make the dough the night before you want to bake the bunny’s and stick it into the refrigerator until you are ready.

But don’t forget to let it come to room temperature before you start shaping.

You can shape your Bunny’s how ever you want. You can let your children do it or make them yourself.

I like to cut the dough into 6 pieces. Each piece now is divided into two parts  1/3 of the Ball for the Head and 2/3 of the dough for the body.

Roll the larger piece into a rope about a foot long coil it around your hand and lay it onto a baking sheet that has some non-stick foil on it. As you can see on my unbaked bunny the ends of the rope are sticking out. One end will be the feet and on the tail ( as you can see my tail became Easter egg big and I will tell you that this is the way I wanted it).

Now take the smaller Ball and form it into a egg shape. With shears snip into the pointy end and cut halfway down the middle to form ears.

Now lay the Head onto the body, make sure you like how it’s placed. Use the egg white as glue to make sure the head stays with the body.

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Make e egg wash out of the egg yolk and the 2 T Milk and brush the Bunnies add a raisin for the eye and decorate with the coarse sugar if desired.

Let rise in a warm place.

Bake at 350°F for 25 - 30 minutes, or until bunnies are golden brown and firm to the touch.

Let them cool on a rack and Enjoy.

Challenging myself : Daring Cooks' March Challenge Balsamic Roasted Beetroot Risotto

The 2010 March Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Eleanor of MelbournefoodGeek and Jess of Jessthebaker. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make risotto. The various components of their challenge recipe are based on input from the Australian Masterchef cookbook and the cookbook Moorish by Greg Malouf.

This was a hard Challenge. Not the cooking of the Risotto, not the time and the mood. The Children are sick again. I myself have a horrible case of bronchitis and since I have Lung problems  and not a full functioning Lung this sucks.

All this I tell you because if I become this sick I usually are unable to taste anything. It`s like chocking down cardboard.

This means I had to wait until the last minutes in the hopes that I would feel better and make a good risotto.

We eat Risotto a lot. Especially in the Summer months my husband and I love to eat a hot Risotto with a sharp fresh Salad from the Garden.

I adore herbs and so it`s no wonder the Risotto we cook most is only favoured with Rosemary. Closely followed by Basil and Parsley.

If we want something different that looks amazing we love a Radicchio Risotto with a fresh Tomato salad.

You see why we usually cook Risotto in the Summer. We use what we find in our Garden.

It`s Winter and I wanted to do something different.

I still have Beetroot in the basement and I adore them Roasted with Balsamic vinegar so this is what I used.

But first I made a chicken stock. This too is nothing new in my kitchen. Since a lot of people in our families have allergies and some are lactose-intolerant I only use homemade stock.

As you can see on the picture I use a real boiling hen, this is the way to go if you want a real tasty stock.

 

For the Risotto I roasted peeled and cut beets sprinkled with Balsamic vinegar for a hour in the oven (200°C).  Half of the Beets I cut into small  cubes, the same size of the diced red onion. The rest of the Beets I pureed into the chicken stock. 

This Risotto is on the sweet side so I used a dollop of Crème fraiche, a lot of Black Pepper and some fresh chives to cut through.

Give it a try and tell me what you think. Now go over to the Daring Bakers Side and look at the amazing thing they did and also get the lovely DOWNLOAD PRINTABLE RECIPES HERE!.