A play on my traditional grissini, tweaked into a festive shape and covered with any toppings you choose, though here I have used hemp seeds, poppy seeds and parmesan.
Notes
Use a fine milled flour, an 00 grade if possible such as Murino Molina from Bakery Bits (which is what I used here) or plain white flour or bread flour for brioche. At a pinch, any strong white bread flour will work if you can’t get a fine flour, but it won’t give you the ultimate crisp snap of a proper grissino.
Equipment
- Large bowl
- Stand mixer with dough hook attachment – if not kneading by hand
- Pizza cutter, bread scraper or long sharp knife (non-serrated)
- Baking trays, lined
- Rolling pin
- Pastry brush
Ingredients
- 300g tipo 00, fine plain or other white flour (see notes above)
- 4 g fast acting dried yeast
- 2/3 teaspoon of fine salt
- 4-5 turns of a pepper mill
- 15mg olive oil
- 195g tepid water
- Added ingredients of your choice, but I used:
- poppy seeds (1-2 tablespoons)
- hemp seeds (1-2 tablespoons)
- grated parmesan (about 10g)
- An egg, whisked and used as a wash
- Additional flour, for dusting the surface as required
Method
- Mix all the ingredients together into a scruffy mess and leave for 10 minutes
- Tip out and knead for 8 – 10 minutes until the dough is smooth and glossy or mix it in your stand mixer
- Leave the dough to rest in a lightly oiled bowl, covered with a tea towel or cling film until about doubled in size (if using continental flour it is likely to just rise by about another 50% instead). This could be anything between 30 – 90 minutes depending on the ambient temperature
- In the meantime, grate the parmesan and ready your seeds/flavourings
- When the dough is ready, lightly flour a surface and use a rolling pin to roll the dough out into as precise a rectangle as possible (any wobbly sides will need to be trimmed off)
- Cut strips from the dough, each about 1 cm thick – cut along the short edge
- Have the paper-lined baking sheets to hand
- Roll each of the strips lightly, so they form tubes rather than ribbons. Try not to stretch them too much (it will be easy to roll them on a less floured surface)
- Form a five pointed star with each strip of dough and pinch the two edges together at an end point:
- Complete stars with all the dough
- Cover and leave to rise again – for about 20-30 minutes until puffed up (they probably won’t double in size)
- Set the oven on to 200C fan / 220C conventional
- Paint an egg wash on each of the dough stars and sprinkle (or grate!) your favoured toppings on. I did a third of the stars in poppy seeds, a third in hemp seeds and the final third with grated parmesan
- Bake for about 17-18 minutes until a nice golden colour (under the toppings)
- Turn off the oven and leave for a further 5 minutes so they are crisp with a nice ‘snap’ when cooled and ready to eat
- Wonderful dipped in a little butter, hummus, salsa or to scoop up fondue or baked camembert
Ink Sugar Spice - Lynn Clark 