If you can bake bread, it is not a given that you can make pastries like croissants or even brioche. If you can make pastries like croissants and brioche, it is not a given that you can bake bread. A lot of people who I have talked to have made this error. "How can you not make croissants?" their question sometimes go. Pastries are in a class of their own, bread in their own. Sourdough kinda falls into its own bread category. I have worked with bakers that can make wonderful loaves with dried yeast, but they cannot work with sourdough. It is two different "ball (bread) games".

But there are some snacks or treats that trouble this rigid classification. Or, I have found some nice snacks that essentially remain bread but utilize brioche and croissant techniques.

In this recipe post, I will share with you what I call Sourdough Bread Knots. It is essentially a bread stick, filled with butter and different flavorings, made into a knot, and baked in a muffin pan. What a combination! But surely an amazing treat. Please read along to see how I make this very delicious snack.

Ingredients

Bread

For this recipe, you will obviously need already ready sourdough bread dough. In this linked post, I give a version of how I make sourdough bread. In this recipe, I use the same process and recipe. I will not rehash the process, but there is the recipe for the bread:

• 1000 grams of flour (a mixture between bread flour, barley flour, and rye flour),
• 800 grams of water,
• 300 grams of sourdough, and
• 23 grams salt.

Fillings

I made three fillings:

• cinnamon sugar which is basically sugar and cinnamon,
• garlic and sesame butter which is sesame seeds, butter and garlic powder, and
• smoked paprika butter which is smoked paprika powder and butter.

Method

The method is very similar to cinnamon buns. You roll out the dough into a flattish rectangle.

Spread your fillings. (I only showcase the cinnamon sugar one here.)

Roll it up into the familiar cinnamon bun "log". Flatten it a little and make a cut through the middle and into the needed amount of "strings" so you can begin to make the knots.

As you will see there are various layers because you rolled the dough into that log, almost making croissant type layers. Also, you make the knot to make even more layers that you can rip open. If you can, make it thinner than I did. But sometimes the dough is too sticky (because I made bread and not pastries).

If I was a pastry chef, I would have made it much prettier. But I am a bread baker and I do not have the skills that most pastry chefs have. Alas, it still goes down the same way! Instagram pretty food does not always taste better.

After you made them, proof them for an hour or so. Add some butter before you bake them. I baked them for 30 minutes or so at 180 degrees Celsius.

Halfway through, I added some more butter on top.

Bake them until they are golden and flaky.

Awaiting you are some of the most delicious snacks! It is sourdough fermented bread but made into knots.

As mentioned above, this is essentially bread. So do not expect brioche or croissant type texture and taste. If you want to go there, this is essentially much healthier than croissant and brioche as it does not contain any sugar and butter. That is except for the filling.

In the above photograph of the cinnamon sugar one, you can see the texture is that of bread and not pastries.

Postscriptum, or Knotty so very Knotty

I hope you give this naughty (knotty - hehe) snack a try. If you have ever tried to make this, please let me know how it was, and if you want to try it, let me know how it went!

I find that the "bland" bread emphasizes the filling's taste. That is, the base bread is not too sweet and rich. It is an excellent blank canvas you can go crazy on. I am already thinking about mozzarella and salami, or tomato and basil pesto. Let your creative mind go wild!

All of the photographs are my own, taken with either my iPhone or Nikon D300. The recipe is also my own. Or at least I did not get the idea from one single source but from my various years of working in kitchens and bakeries and from countless YouTube videos. I hope you try this recipe and happy cooking! Stay safe.