Bowls, Buns, or Both?

There is something wonderfully ridiculous about looking at a bowl of soup and deciding that the bowl should also be edible. At least, that was my thought when I decided to make broccoli cheddar soup the other day. And instead of just making some bread to crumble into the soup, I decided, “Why not make the bowl out of bread?!”

Like any self-proclaimed soup connoisseur, I love a well-made bread bowl. There is just something about the soup soaking into the bread, while the bread stays sturdy enough to hold everything together.

I have been baking for a while, but tackling a bread bowl seemed absolutely far-fetched in my mind. But I wanted to try it out anyway. The recipe was easy enough: bread flour, olive oil, salt, a little bit of sugar, dry active yeast, and warm water. Simple right? Yeah, I thought so too. Until I heated my water in the microwave and absolutely did not let it cool down enough before adding my yeast. Ten minutes later, when I came back to check my rising yeast, there was yeast, but no rise. I killed my yeast. That was mess-up number one.

Obviously, I tried again, this time checking my water temperature before adding in the yeast. After a successful rise, I added everything to my stand mixer and let it knead for a little bit. Then came proofing time. I added my dough to a bowl, covered it with a towel, set it in the microwave, and forgot about it for the next hour and a half.

My timer went off; I checked my dough, and it had risen beautifully. Excitedly, I punched the dough ball down and went to pull it out of the bowl. But it wasn’t all coming out the way it should be. Mess up number two: I didn’t grease my bowl.

But that’s okay! I managed to get everything out, divided it into six little dough balls, and let them rise for a little bit. A few minutes in, though, I decided that I didn’t want to have six little bread bowls because I certainly didn’t plan to make enough soup for that. Sure, I could bake it all and freeze it, but that didn’t sound like fun. So I decided they were going to become burger buns.

Now that everything had risen and was almost ready to bake, I started on my soup. And as I was adding my broccoli into my soup base, I remembered that I forgot to buy carrots earlier. Not so much a mess-up, but definitely a sad realization because I love carrots in a broccoli cheddar soup. And somewhere along the way, I also managed to lose the soup recipe I had been following. I never found it again, so at that point I decided to hope for the best and kept cooking.

Then it was time to bake my first-ever bread bowl and burger buns! I popped everything into the oven, finished up my soup, and impatiently waited for the bread timer to go off.

My kitchen smelled like a bakery. My mouth was watering. My stomach was growling. And the timer finally went off. I pulled the bread pans out, brushed over my creations with some butter, and once again waited for it all to cool down.

And then it was finally the moment to cut the center of my bowl out and add my soup. It was amazing. The bread was sturdy, but still soft. The soup was so creamy. I finished it off in five minutes flat. And after eating that entire thing, I realized that I never added salt or pepper.

Baking and cooking, like everything else in life, throw curveballs. You are going to forget an ingredient or two. You may kill your yeast with 130-degree water. Or forget to oil your proofing bowl. But that doesn’t mean that something amazing can’t still come from your hard work. Laugh about it and keep going.

There is always something new that you can achieve, all because you allowed yourself to slow down and try.

And P.S., my burger buns also turned out incredible. Maybe a tad bit too tall, but they are now a must-have for all future burger nights.