Happy Sweet Potato accident

At school, we're in the middle of the second part of the Viennoiserie (bread) unit. Making everything from challah to oat bread with blueberries and walnuts, to stollen, pannetone, and fruitcake, cornbread and croissants of every kind. We've even gotten into one of my favorite breads of all time: brioche. The eggy, sweet, teensy rolls that are good with sweet or savory filling. This week was the class I had been waiting for since I first saw the syllabus for the whole first unit of class: Sweet Potato Brioche.

Those of you who have talked to me both during the fall and during the spring/summer grilling season know my LOVE LOVE LOOOOOVE of sweet potatoes. When I saw that we could make one of my favorite breads with one of my favorite root vegetables, I was 100% sold. Soooo it figures that this is the day we throw something off.

Thursday we were making a few different things. One of them was Pain Ordinaire (regular bread dough). This dough is a direct mix, which means that everything is combined at once and mixed, then set aside to ferment and double. Normally doughs are made in stages (12 to be exact) which include adding the yeast and salt after an autolyse process, then proofed a couple times before being cut and pre-shaped, bench rested, shaped and final proofed. Not the case with Pain Ordinaire. We had made that dough and then put it in the proof box to double in size.

It was also the same color and size (but not texture) as the sponge we had put together for the base to our Sweet Potato Brioche. THe sponge is used to pre-ferment the yeast and cut down on how long the dough has to be allowed to rest before we can work up the rest of the gluten structure. When we went to put together the rest of the sweet potato brioche, i stepped away to wash dishes or something and there was what was supposed to be the ST sponge. Not thinking clearly, I did question whether or not to add it to the rest of the mixture in the Hobart. I think I even said 'I'm nervous about adding this in...' But in the end, i threw it in and finished the rest of the brioche dough and worked it to a great consistency and smell.

It wasn't until I went over to the proof box and found a bowl labeled 'ST Brioche Dough' with our names on it did I realize I should have trusted my intuition. We still had a sweet potato sponge, and now, a brioche that had a ton more yeast in it than usual, etc. However, we would have to wait until next class to find out.

Once we had our pre-shaped 'brioches' egg washed, we noticed that the only difference between our dough and everyone elses was the color. Ours was a slightly less orange-y hue. We popped them into the oven and hoped for the best. What we got was a surprisingly great result! Sweet Potato dinner rolls. AND because of the decreased (overall) amount of sugar, we think that it made the flavors we seasoned the sweet potatoes with really pop out.

All in all, not a bad result to a potential disaster. I was lucky enough to get some of the rolls (real ones) and they live in my freezer.

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