Onion and sage baps

I happened upon an episode of Hairy Bikers, and two of the recipes they made that day appealed to me:  parsnip and apple soup, and these savory rolls.  It's been rainy for days, and one of my new year's resolutions is to cook more.  At the time I was cooking, I did not know there were written recipes available, so I was going off the video of the episode.  They weren't entirely clear in the video of everything they were doing, but nothing left unclear was terribly critical.  Maybe.  (See asterisk.)

The baps they made had seemed rather small (and didn't use a full loaf's worth of flour), so I made the full recipe, which actually resulted in 8 fairly good-sized, though quite fluffy rolls.  My only known deviations from their recipe was the flour and adding cheese.  Here's what I used:

150ml (0.6 cup) milk
150ml (0.6 cup) water
1½ teaspoon rapid rise yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
400g (2½ cups) bread flour
200g high-protein white whole wheat flour
200g high-protein AP flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter*
1 tablespoon oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, grated or crushed
approximately 12 large sage leaves, finely chopped*
large pinch of black pepper
approximately 1 cup grated pecorino Romano cheese

Heat the milk and water until quite warm; use about 1/4 cup to proof the yeast and sugar.  Once proved, add the remainder of  the liquid, along with the yeast mixture, to the flour and salt.  Knead for about 10 minutes, until smooth and elastic.  Form into a ball; place in a greased bowl and allow to rise, covered, until doubled-- about 1 - 1½ hours.  Meanwhile, heat the butter and oil in a medium frying pan; add the onion and garlic and sweat over low heat for 10 minutes until soft and transparent, but not browned.  Add the sage and pepper and cook for another 2 - 3 minutes.  Set aside to cool.

Punch down the dough; remove from the bowl and flatten out on work surface.  Spread the onion mixture (and cheese, if using) over the dough, then roll up so all the filling is contained.  Knead the filling into the dough until it is evenly distributed, sprinkling with flour where it becomes too wet.  Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces; roll each into a ball.  Arrange the dough balls in a greased baking sheet in a circle with one in the middle and edges touching.  Cover lightly with oiled plastic film and allow to rise until doubled, about 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 375F (to 400F).  Before baking, brush each roll lightly with milk, then top with a single, small sage leaf.  Bake for about 20 minutes.  Move to a rack to cool.

*Their written recipe calls for "1/2 ounce" of butter (1 tablespoon - I'm sure they used more on the show) and "15 - 20 sage leaves" (probably what I should have used, given the size of my leaves.)

They mixed their dry yeast, salt, sugar, and flour all together, then added the warm liquid.  I decided to proof my yeast first, since I was using less.  The butter and oil measurements weren't given; their pan of onion was liberally oily, but I didn't know the ratio of butter and oil, so I estimated.  (I assume just a small amount of oil is present to prevent the butter from browning.)  The yeast was given as "1 sachet", which is presumably 2¼ teaspoons, though I chose to use a little less.  Their sage leaves were quite large and I suspect I didn't use nearly as much.  They probably had at least 1/3 cup of chopped sage, if not 1/2 cup.  (It was certainly a manly handful.)  I noticed their rolls had probably twice as much green speckled throughout as mine did.  Their oven instructions were for "190C to 200C" (375F - 400F).  I've never seen a recipe with a range for the oven temperature, and both of these are higher than I normally see in a bread recipe.  I don't know why they didn't provide a single temperature.  (He probably couldn't remember the correct temperature at the moment of filming.  The written recipe indicates 200C, which I think would have been better than 190C.)  My oven does not maintain a stable temperature; it was 400F when I was ready to bake, but I tried to cool it down a bit after putting the rolls in and then worked to keep it at 375F.  They looked done at 20 minutes, so I took them out.

I had concerns about the baps being too salty with added cheese, (I used salted butter with the onions, and the dough already tasted a bit salty), but in the end they were okay.  Salty, yes, but not too bad for a savory roll.  (If I used more cheese, I would cut down on the salt elsewhere.)

Conclusion:  Easy enough to make, but I wasn't thrilled with the result.  Surprisingly, they were a bit bland and tasted a little floury.  Something gave them a slightly bitter taste, perhaps the whole wheat flour or the cheese.  They also could have used just another minute or two in the oven-- baking at 400F likely would have been perfect.

Recipe:  sage and onion tear and share bread via Hairy Bikers (season 1, episode 2 of Best of British)