Potato hot pockets – Toaster Oven baked

Last weekend, I was taking the pictures of a recipe. DH entered the kitchen with a bang, “It has already been posted”. He was holding the laptop in his hands. I was quite surprised that he started noticing what I am about to write in the coming weeks and started worrying about unique contents for the blog. I felt so happy, not just that he noticed but also that I got some points to talk with my friends.

Well to be frank, I had the same worries until couple of months ago. With so many food blogs out there, almost all the recipes that I wanted to blog about were already blogged in a way or the other. This made me less energetic and food photos started to pile up as I didn’t want to write about them. But, I am not a person who gives up on anything too quick and I told myself that there must be something left for me.

I reminded myself of our neighbor, Pattu Maami, back home. During the “Navarathri” celebrations, it is a tradition to give gifts for small girls and married women. Those who celebrate the festival invite the girls and women of the neighborhood and offer them cute gifts. Pattu Maami gave much attention to what other neighbors offered as gift. While this might sound funny, she did that for a reason. She never gave the same gift that others gave. She offered the gifts that were most useful to them. She would show all the gifts that she bought for us and asked us to pick the one that we wanted most. She mentioned that it avoided giving the same item to same person every year.

I took her as inspiration and started looking what useful points that I can add to an existing topic. I started seeing new dimensions which boosted my energy. My friends, there are so many things left unsaid. With life turning too busy and the emphasis on living healthy raising high, each and every point we add will add value to the same topic.

That said, Let’s talk about another SV Bakery’s Famous recipe – Palya Bun and my approach to this recipe. Palya Bun is a Potato and vegetables stuffed hot pockets eaten as snack in Bangalore. I used to bake them for our “Grab and Go” Breakfast. Normally, I bake a dozen hot pockets that we will take for the week’s breakfast. But after some time we felt that eating the same thing for breakfast was boring. So, I decided to plan a variety of make ahead recipes. That was when I started to explore freezing the shaped rolls. After the kneading, raising and shaping the rolls, I wrap them individually with freezer wrap. Place them in a cookie sheet and freeze them. After freezing, I will store the rolls in a freezer bag. Whenever needed I will take half a dozen and thaw them. After giving some time to raise again, I will bake them. But I always felt that cranking up the whole oven for just half a dozen rolls was waste of energy. So I used to plan other baking chores along with that. If I had nothing to bake for that week, I would look for other breakfast options rather than pulling out the frozen rolls or an alternate way to bake in smaller amounts.

I got an opportunity to find that way, when my sister sent a gift certificate for our house warming ceremony. It was an online gift certificate. I searched for the items that I would use often and that has free shipping. I came across a nice toaster oven with convection bake and broil options. I must say it is a boon to my baking needs. A toaster oven heats up and cooks faster that a normal oven. Also, it uses 1/3 of energy than the normal oven. These facts added more to my happiness. My baking horizons started expanding with my toaster oven and you will see more toaster oven recipes like this in future posts.

Ingredients:

For the Dough:

3 cups All purpose flour or Whole wheat flour
1 cup Active starter (or 1 tsp Dry yeast)
1/3 cup oil
1 Tbsp Sugar
1 tsp Salt

For the Filling

3 large potatoes (Baked in Microwave and mashed)
1/2 cup Carrot shredded (Other veggies like cabbage or sweet corn can be added)
1/2 cup Green Bell pepper Shredded
2 tsp Salt
1 tsp Garam Masala
1 tsp Amchur

**** I don’t use Onions or Garlic as I store the rolls in Freezer. If you are using, Brown the onion and garlic before adding to the filling. ****

Method:

1. Mix the ingredients for the dough and knead into soft and elastic dough.
2. Cover and allow to raise until doubled in volume.
3. Mix the ingredients for the filling and shape into lime sized balls.

Filling

4. Punch down the raised dough and shape into orange sized balls.

Dough

5. Take a ball of dough and flatten into 2 inch disc.
6. Place the filling in the middle.

Filling in the middle

7. Bring the edges together and pinch to seal the edge.

Palya bun covered

8. Place in a cookie sheet. Cover and allow to raise again for 1 hour.
9. At this point, either you can bake in a 350F preheated oven for 40 minutes.
10. If storing for future use, Wrap the shaped rolls individually and place in cookie sheet and put it in freezer.

Frozen Palya Bun

11. Once frozen store in a freezer bag.
12. When you plan to bake, take the necessary number of rolls, unwrap and place in a toaster oven sheet.
13. Allow to thaw to room temperature. If time permits, allow to raise for 1 hour. (If using sourdough, it will take 2-3 hours)

Thawed palya bun

14. Place in a toaster oven and bake in 350F for 25 minutes or until browned.

Palya Bun Toaster Oven

The Table Top Toaster oven can bake upto 6 rolls!!!

Palya Bun - Toaster oven baked

This is my entry for this week’s Yeast Spotting event hosted by Susan – the wild yeast.