Sun’s Out, Buns Out

Words and photos by Andrew Janjigian

While I bake crusty, rustic sourdough loaves year-round, come summer I find myself craving something more plush and pillowy, especially when sandwiches are on the menu. A bread with character, but one that is willing to play second fiddle to the filling. My go-to sandwich bun—whether destined to cradle a hamburger, a hot dog, a mound of pulled pork or a heap of buttery, warm lobster meat—is a supermarket potato roll. The kind with a fine, squishy, golden-hued crumb and a shelf life specified in months rather than weeks or days.

I know that extreme longevity comes thanks to the use of a long list of additives that are probably best consumed only in moderation, which is why I’ve always wondered how closely I could re-create one of these buns at home, using staple ingredients. I had no illusions I could make a roll that would stay soft and plush for more than a few days, much less months, but I had a good idea how to achieve a similar texture in a freshly baked one: Use a pre-cooked starch.

The reason these rolls include potato in the formula is not to inject them with the flavor of potatoes—which they do not have. It’s to help make them soft. Potatoes are chock full of starch, and starches are unparalleled at holding onto moisture, especially after they have been cooked. Adding cooked, mashed potatoes to bread dough significantly increases the amount of water it contains, without making the dough itself more sticky or loose-textured. (Cooked starches amount to “stealth” moisture in a bread dough.)

Rather than start with raw potatoes that I had to peel, cook, mash and cool down before I could start making a dough, I opted here for supermarket instant mashed potato flakes, which are nothing more than potatoes that are baked, grated and dehydrated. While I have not much use for them otherwise, they make a perfect choice for an off-the-shelf pre-cooked starch for bread doughs. To rehydrate them, I just pour boiling water over the flakes in the stand mixer and use the paddle to quickly turn them into smooth mashed potatoes. Once the small amount of potato cools down enough, I switch to the dough hook, add the remaining liquids and flours and turn it into a dough. (I do let the dough rest briefly before adding the butter and salt, to encourage maximum gluten development before mixing even begins.)

Potatoes aren’t the only source of tenderness in these rolls, of course; a generous quotient of butter helps too, as does some egg. I landed on four tablespoons of butter and a single egg for eight standard-sized hamburger or hot dog buns.

And that signature potato bun vivid yellow color? That was easily achieved, using a tiny amount of ground turmeric and ground annatto. (Sorting this out didn’t take much sleuthing on my part, since both ingredients are listed on the bag of my favorite brand of potato rolls.) These two spices are used for aesthetic reasons only and can be left out if you don’t have them; turmeric is generally easy to find, while annatto might require a trip to a specialty store, like a Latin grocer or my fave Cambridge spice merchant, Curio Spice.

Once I had a base potato bun formula I was happy with, I created a couple of variations: an indulgent brioche version with two extra eggs and twice the butter, and a (slightly) healthier one using whole-wheat flour in place of some of the bread flour. (I sift out the wheat bran in a sieve and use some of it as a garnish on top of the buns; it will take on a nutty flavor as it bakes.)

I’ve included instructions for shaping each of these doughs into eight burger buns or 12 smaller slider buns, baked freeform on a rimmed baking sheet, and for eight split-top New England–style hot dog buns, baked nestled together in a 13- by 9-inch cake pan. (To keep the round buns wider than they are tall, I proof them weighted down by a second sheet pan, which forces them to rise out rather than up.)

As for which sorts of fillings go into which type of roll, that’s totally up to you. I like the basic potato one for burgers and dogs, the wheat one for cold sandwiches like egg salad or turkey, and the brioche dough for lobster rolls and—when formed into smaller slider buns—brioche con gelato, a Sicilian breakfast indulgence that is a few scoops of gelato stuffed into a brioche bun. Here are some recipes and sources for all the fillings you’ll need.

I’ll no doubt still buy potato buns from the supermarket once in a while, but if I'm entertaining, this easy recipe is my new summer go-to.