Foodie Fridays: Quickie Buns!!

Hey Humble Readers...

I hope that you've all had a good week.  Things in our little hobbit-hole have been challenging, but productive.  Ginny's most recent very long drawn out round of teething has finally resulted in something... her first molar!  While she's teething, she seems to be much more likely to get herself into trouble like messing with Mommy's books, destroying the shoe rack, or pushing all the buttons on the dvr.  Today she actually managed to almost post on my blog.  She pushed a bunch of random keys on my netbook and when I got back to the computer, there was a new post started, all gibberish (not that that's so different from what I post, but still...).  She alternated between particularly mischievous and completely inconsolable this morning, but after her nap she was a much much happier wee girl.  And there was a shiny new tooth! 

But somehow, in the midst of dealing with a truly unhappy toddler, I managed to make these buns the other day.  I've actually made them a few times, and I've loved them every single time.  The original recipe called these "30 Minute Rolls" but if you do the math on the times quoted, it actually adds up to 35 minutes.  Combine that with the fact that I tweaked the baking time a bit, and well, 'quickie buns' just works.  AND considering that these are yeast rolls, anything less than two hours is pretty gosh darn awesome!

Quickie Buns

1 cup + 2 tbsp warm water (I heat mine in the microwave for about 40 seconds)
1/3 cup canola or olive oil
2 tbsp fast acting yeast
1/4 cup sugar (do not sub in Spl.enda... I learned this the hard way)
1 tsp salt
1 egg
3 1/2 cup flour

Preheat your oven to 400F, and grease/spray a 9x13 baking pan.  In your mixer bowl combine the water, oil, yeast and sugar and allow it to rest for 15 minutes. Using your dough hook, mix in the salt, egg and flour. Knead with hook until will incorporated and dough is soft and smooth, 2-3 minutes. (Honestly, I don't know how long to knead the dough for if you don't have a mixer with a dough hook... I'm sorry.  I'm a bit dense when it comes to baking.)

I need to work on my bun rolling skills! 
They aren't very evenly sized. 

Form dough into 12 balls, place in prepared pan, and allow to rest, covered with a towel, for 10 minutes. Bake for 15-17 minutes.

After resting for 10 minutes

Like I mentioned previously, the original recipe called for the rolls to be baked for 10 minutes, but I found that they came out too pale and doughy for me.  Keep an eye on them as they bake... everyone's oven is different.

The finished product - these actually ended up baking for
about 20 minutes because I got distracted.  The crust
was a bit chewier than usual, but they were still great.