Thursday, January 23, 2014

Amish Potato Rolls and Mysteries



Here at Mystery Playground, we like food and mysteries. In honor of author Amanda Flower's birthday and her Amish mysteries - we are sharing the recipe for Amish Potato rolls (get it - Flower and flour...). 

The photos, rising rolls by the fire and the baking are courtesy of Janet Kuchler in the Portland office of Mystery Playground. The recipe is courtesy of King Arthur Flour. 




Amanda has two Amish mystery series, one called the Appleseed Creek mysteries and another about Amish quilt shops. 

The first in the Appleseed Creek Mysteries is...


A PLAIN DEATH


An unlikely friendship between a high-tech woman and a runaway Amish girl leads to murder. Her first day in Appleseed Creek, Ohio, Chloe Humphrey, befriends Becky, an ex-Amish teenager looking for a new home. While driving Chloe’s car, Becky collides with a buggy, killing an Amish bishop in the process. The case moves from accident to murder when police reveal a cut brake line. Now, Chloe and Becky’s handsome brother, Timothy, must discover who the real intended victim is before the murderer makes a second attempt.



The first in the Amish Quilt series is:

MURDER PLAIN AND SIMPLE:

When Angela Braddock inherits her late aunt’s beautiful Amish quilt shop, she leaves behind her career and broken engagement for a fresh start in Holmes County, Ohio.
  
With her snazzy cowboy boots and her ornithophobic French bulldog, Angie doesn’t exactly fit in with the predominantly Amish community in Rolling Brook, but her aunt’s quilting circle makes her feel at home as she prepares for the reopening of Running Stitch. On the big day, Angie gets a taste of success as the locals and Englisch tourists browse the store’s wares while the quilters stitch away. But when Angie finds the body of ornery Amish woodworker Joseph in her storeroom, the future of Running Stitch looks bleak. With evidence mounting against her, Angie is determined to find the culprit before the local sheriff can make an arrest. Rolling Brook appears to be a simple place, but the closer Angie gets to the killer, the more she realizes that nothing in the small Amish community is as plain as it seems. . . 

And now for the food...

Amish Dinner Rolls (From the King Arthur Flour website

Ingredients:

2 eggs
1/3 cup (2 1/2 ounces) sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
6 tablespoons (3 ounces) butter
1 cup (7 1/4 ounces) unseasoned mashed potatoes, lightly packed*
2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
3/4 cup water (potato water, if possible)
4 1/4 cups (18 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

*1 medium-to-large baking potato will yield 8 ounces of mashed potato. 


Manual/Mixer Method: In a medium-sized mixing bowl, combine all of the ingredients, and mix until the dough starts to leave the sides of the bowl. Transfer the dough to a lightly greased or floured surface, and knead it for 6 to 8 minutes, or until it's smooth and shiny. Or knead it in a mixer, using the dough hook. Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl or rising bucket, turn to coat, cover the container with plastic wrap, and let the dough rise till it's doubled in bulk, about 90 minutes.

Bread Machine Method: Place all the ingredients into the pan of your bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer (usually, liquids first, yeast last). Program the machine for dough or manual, and press Start. Check the dough about 10 minutes before the end of the final kneading cycle and adjust its consistency as necessary by adding additional water or flour to form a soft, smooth ball. Allow the machine to complete its cycle, then allow the dough to remain in the machine till it's doubled in bulk, perhaps an additional 30 minutes or so.

Shaping: To make stand-alone rolls, divide the dough into 16 equal pieces. If you want to make soft-sided, pull-apart rolls, divide the dough into 15 pieces. This isn't as challenging as it sounds: first, divide the dough into three equal pieces (about 375g, 14 ounces, each). Pinch off one piece, about the size of a racquetball or handball (75g, 2 3/4 ounces), off each of the three pieces, setting the pinched-off pieces aside; then simply divide what's left of the three pieces into four pieces each. Presto! Fifteen balls of dough. Gently roll the dough balls under your cupped fingers till they're nice and round.

Place the 16 dough balls onto a parchment-lined or lightly greased baking sheet or sheets, leaving about 2 inches between them. Or place the 15 dough balls into a lightly greased 9 x 13-inch pan, spacing them evenly in five rolls of three balls each. Cover the pan(s) with a proof cover or lightly greased plastic wrap, and allow the rolls to rise for about 2 hours, till they're quite puffy; the rolls in the 9 x 13-inch pan should be touching (or almost touching) one another. 

Dough rising by the fire.
Baking: Bake the rolls in a preheated 350°F oven for 20 to 25 minutes, till they're golden brown. Remove them from the oven, carefully turn them out of the pan -- the pull-apart rolls will come out all in one piece -- and brush them with melted butter, if desired. Serve warm or at room temperature. Yield: 15 or 16 rolls.


Nutrition information per serving (1 pull-apart roll, 74g): 200 cal, 6g fat, 5g protein, 28g complex carbohydrates, 4g sugar, 1g dietary fiber, 41mg cholesterol, 223mg sodium, 117mg potassium, 58RE vitamin A, 2mg vitamin C, 2mg iron, 6mg calcium, 58mg phosphorus. 

Don't these look yummy!

7 comments:

  1. I am wiping drool off my iPad-- wow do those look great. I'm a potato roll fan.

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    Replies
    1. Too bad we can't deliver them right through the blog. That technology is coming, right?

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