Norwegian Cinnamon Buns - Wet Dough

Asked by bh73. Answered on 23rd June 2011

Full question

I have made this recipe from How To Be A Domestic Goddess (p322) on several occasions and always love the outcome. I have, however, never been able to get away with using the 600g of flour that the recipe calls for. I am not sure if I am doing something wrong, but I invariably require substantially more flour. Please help. Thanks

Our answer

Bakers have a little saying about bread dough - "the wetter, the better". A damp bread dough will tend to yield a lighter, more open loaf. However this needs to be within reason and a dough that is too wet can also be quite difficult to handle. All flours have different absorbencies so will tend to require slightly different volumes of liquid. Whenever making yeasted doughs we would suggest that you don't add all of the liquid at once as you can always add a little more if necessary, and this is preferable to adding large quantities of extra flour.

For the Norwegian buns whisk the melted butter and eggs with half of the milk (200mls/scant 1 cup) and add this to the flour/yeast mixture first. Mix together and add the remaining milk a little at a time, until you have a soft dough. As you are going to knead the dough you don't need to worry about over-mixing the dough at this stage. We would suggest aiming for a dough which is slightly damp but not "wet" or very sticky.

If you are working with wetter doughs then it is much easier to knead the dough in a free-standing mixer with a dough hook than on a work surface. When the dough does its first rise it will tend to become a little less wet and is easier to handle.