How To Bake Pandesal and Other Breads

Using the same dough for regular sized Cinnamon Rolls, i made both my private baking class and group students create minis for a petite size version. Takes a lot of hard work but it was definitely much more fun to eat. When my nephew Luke was only 7 years old he told me it tasted better than the large rolls, and wanted more. Judging from what happens to them when i place them on the table, the mini petite rolls disappear faster than the bigger cousins. Try baking them at 350 F to golden brown crispy to get the sugar thick and gooey or the paler light brown at 325 F for a softer texture. I prefer the first one because the sugar and syrup sort of turns taffy like although this one will definitely have to be eaten the day itself or the next day. We used a sweet yeast dough, do not put cinnamon on the baking pans and use the best maple syrup (ours is from Vermont in Canada). This is the one made by the girls as show below; I show how to do the first one and the rest is done by th...

If you ask me, a 10-quart mixer this size looked very heavy and so i thought when i first tried this way back 1998. Not anymore. I mixed some dough the other day and i was surprised to find the bowls sooooo light like a feather compared to my 20 quart bowl. I used to complain about how heavy it was before and i would even wait for my helper to show up before i make a batch of rolls. Or ask my sister if her helper can come over so she can help me out, you know how those helpers are, they disappear as fast as your cellphone load. Anyway, it looked like the heavy lifting did me some good so i am not going to be dragged down by the weight of the bowl anymore, good for everyone, there will always be breads on the table. This batch is 1 kilogram, a sweet yeast dough where half was used for the cinnamon rolls and half for plain dinner rolls. The recipe has 18% sugar, 15% eggyolks, 15% butter, and 2% yeast. Other than these, the rest of the formula is pretty much the same like your ordinar...

When I left the restaurant scene out of a broken eardrum (no, not from swimmer's ear) I decided to take up on baking seriously since i know i will not dwell well in the hot kitchen or as we call it "the back of the house".. It was hot, you bump on to guys who are sweating round the clock and being new and a "girl" you kinda like the unofficial muse in the kitchen and nobody takes you seriously. Seriously. It is true, these guys all 8 of them trained together for a month before they opened the restaurant so they know each other. Here you are, apprenticing and so small you look pretty much like you entered the restaurant looking for your father. Meaning one of the cooks. For a while you do not seem to care, but later on as the gruelling task of unending potato peeling and onion chopping, you feel like you needed to say something, or else, you will be buried with more potatoes and onions to peel and chop. Not that it looked so bad, after all there were 3 of us. Ver...