Basic Brioche & Cardamom Buns

A one-size-fits-all dough, for cardamom buns, doughnuts, maritozzi, semla, and more. Mostly sourdough with a touch of yeast thrown in for good measure.

This is the dough I teach probably more than any other dough. That’s because it has infinite uses. Bake it on it’s own to turn it into a light and fluffy loaf, or shape it into any number of things, or fry it to make doughnuts. I just taught this dough as part of a cardamom bun and semla class while home in Minnesota for a couple of weeks, where all my baking seems to take a Scandinavian turn.

This recipe is mostly sourdough, but incorporates a bit of yeast for good measure: that’s to keep things from getting too sour, and to bump up the proofing time a bit. If you don’t have sourdough, replace the levain with a poolish by mixing another couple of grams of yeast with 50 grams each of water and bread flour and letting it rise for a couple hours before mixing the dough.

For the geeks: we’re using mostly, but not all, bread flour here. Too much bread flour and you’d have a chewy texture, and we want these to be soft and delicate. So 100g of the mix is AP or pastry flour, and it’s fun to use white whole wheat or high-extraction flour here to add some color and flavor to the dough. Lastly, a brioche contains a lot of butter—more butter than normally wants to go into a dough, in fact. That’s why the dough gets mixed first until nearly full gluten development, and then the butter gets whipped in after: you’re basically tricking the dough to absorb more butter than it might otherwise.

You can find instructions for how to turn these into cardamom buns below. Find out how to make maritozzi, brioche tarts, or semla on a separate paid subscription post.

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BASIC BRIOCHE

yields: ~ 2 small loaves,12-16 cardamom buns or maritozzi or semla, 4 brioche tarts

INGREDIENTS

Bread Flour: 430g

All-purpose Flour, Whole Wheat Flour, or Pastry Flour: 100g

Levain, fully ripened (or poolish): 100g

Sugar: 70g

Milk: 300g

Salt: 1tsp

Active dry yeast: 3g

Whole Egg: 1

Butter, room temperature: 180g

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Add the flours, salt, sugar, and yeast into the bowl of a stand mixer. Use a spoon or fork to mix everything together just until combined.

2. Whisk the egg and add in to the dry mix, along with the milk and levain. 

3. Equip a dough hook to the mixer and turn the mixer on low until everything roughly combines, and turn to medium-high speed until the dough pulls away from the side of the bowl. This may take a few minutes. 

4. When the dough looks cohesive, taut, and smooth, add in the butter 1 cube at a time with the mixer running on medium speed. Let it incorporate for a few seconds before adding another cube, and continue to do this until all the butter is incorporated. The dough will likely begin to look slack and tacky at first. Turn the mixer back up to a medium-high speed and mix until the dough once again comes off the sides and bottom of the bowl, which will often take another couple of minutes. 

5. Cover and let rise for 45 minutes to an hour. Knead briefly to remove some of its air, wrap the bowl in plastic wrap, and let sit in the fridge for at least 4 hours or overnight before shaping.

Cardamom Filling:  

6 ⅔ oz/200 grams (1 stick + 6 T) butter at room temperature 

4 ⅓ oz/130 grams (⅔ C) sugar 

2 T ground cardamom 

Directions: Cream the butter, sugar and cardamom together in a bowl. Keep at room temperature. 

Cardamom Glaze:

1 cup sugar  

1 cup water  

1 ½ Tbl ground cardamom  

Pinch of salt

Directions: 

1.Combine all ingredients in a saucepan, bring to a boil, stirring occasionally to dissolve the sugar, then turn off the heat and let come down to room temperature. 

Roll dough into a rectangle about 16-20” wide and 12” tall, at around ⅛” thickness. Dust with flour as needed and use your hands to even out the sides if need-be.  

Trim edges of dough to make a neat rectangle, and then smear the filling over the  bottom half of the dough, using a dough scraper or spatula to spread it evenly to the edges. Fold over the top half of the dough to sandwich the filling in between two layers of dough and use a rolling pin to push the rectangle back to 12” to 16” wide and 6” tall.  (those that have taken workshops with me will know this part is pretty forgiving. We’re shooting for those measurements, but as long as you’re pretty close you should be fine)

Using a knife or bench scraper, cut the dough into even strips about 1 ¼” inch wide, then cut these  in half but leave ½” at the top, making what should look like a pair of pants (yes, a pair of pants!). Pull these two legs into one long rope, about 12” to 14” in length, and begin to spiral into a bun. Wrap the last 6” under the bun, then over the top, and finally tuck it back under and press lightly into the bun to seal. Place buns on a sheet tray lined with parchment paper and cover with plastic wrap or a towel. 

Proof for about 2 to 3 hours or until they have expanded visibly and indent upon touch. 30 minutes before it’s time to bake, preheat the oven to 400 degrees, and make the simple syrup glaze. Bake for about 15-20 minutes, or until the top is well-browned. Remove from oven, brush with cardamom simple syrup, and (optional) sprinkle sparkling sugar and/or flake salt on top.