Brioche Hamburger Buns

Rich, eggy, and buttery, these fluffy rolls have a soft, pillowy consistency—they’re like regular hamburger buns on steroids. You’ll want to slice and fill them with your favorite juicy burger to give it its due.

The not-so-well-kept secret to brioche dough is butter, and plenty of it. Its origin is French (mais, oui!), probably in Normandy where butter rules, and dating as far back as the 17th century. While it is most often made into a savory bread or roll, it also answers the call of the sweet tooth, filled with custard, cream or jam.

Brioche is a very versatile dough, and in practical terms, because of its richness, it keeps well, and despite its softness, is sturdy enough to stand up to a juicy burger — especially when slathered with butter and toasted it. Read up on How to Grill the Perfect Burger and you have a match made in barbecue heaven.

Brioche is worth making for burger buns, but it’s also great to have this classic pastry technique in your back pocket to turn into other goodies. You can also use brioche as a vehicle for butter and jam or fill them with your favorite sandwich filling like chicken salad, egg salad, or pulled pork. Let your imagination run wild!

What is Classic Brioche?

While these rolls are going to take a little more time and effort, they are not out of reach for the home cook, and in hands-on terms, not as time consuming as you might assume.

This recipe is based on the classic method of making a sponge or starter and letting it rise for 45 minutes or so. Add eggs and flour to the sponge to make a soft dough and knead it for about 8 minutes in a stand mixer. Add cool but creamy butter to the dough and when it is fully incorporated, let the dough rise for about an hour at room temperature.

At this point it’ll be very soft and sticky, and truthfully, would be impossible to shape. Perhaps that’s the reasoning behind the traditional method of giving it an overnight rest in the refrigerator. It rises more in the fridge and the dough stiffens, so shaping it the next day is much easier.

Finally, the rolls get an egg wash just before baking and emerge puffy and golden from the oven.

Tips for Success with Brioche Burger Buns

Any time you make something new it can be challenging, but these tips should help you navigate the some of the recipe’s finer points.

• As you knead it and add butter to the dough, don’t hesitate to scrape down the bowl and the dough that creeps up the dough hook from time to time. It will eventually come together to form one dough ball so don’t panic!
• Cold dough is easy to work with and shape. Once you take the dough out of the fridge after its overnight rise, work quickly. If it becomes warm and unmanageable, put it in the freezer for a few minutes until it firms up again.
• Weigh the rolls to make them all the same size. If you have a scale, weigh the dough and then divide the weight by 8 to determine the weight of each roll. Start by cutting it into wedges and make adjustments as needed. If you don’t have a scale, don’t worry; just eyeball it. Perfection is overrated.
• Before flattening the dough on the baking sheet, space the rolls about 3 inches apart.

How to Adapt the Recipe

If you’ve never made brioche before, I urge you to follow the recipe as is. I would say that is sound advice any time you try something new, especially in baking. Then you can experiment with a much better likelihood of success once you are familiar with the technique.

Here are a few brioche swaps, substitutions, and alternate ideas:

• If you want to use whole wheat flour, use whole wheat pastry flour or half all purpose flour and half whole wheat flour. Whole wheat flour absorbs more liquid than white flour, so you will have to decrease the flour or increase the liquid to make adjustments.
• Make slider buns by dividing the dough into 16 pieces and shape them in the same way.
• As far as toppings go, lightweight seeds like sesame, poppy, or minced dried onions are excellent; just be sure to brush the rolls with egg wash so the seeds adhere.
• Skip the egg wash altogether and brush the buns with melted butter when they come out of the oven, too.

How to Store, Freeze, and Thaw Brioche Rolls

Store completely cooled buns in a plastic zipper bag for up to 3 days. (Warm buns will encourage condensation in the bag which will make the bread soggy).

For longer storage, wrap each roll in plastic and then freeze in a zip top freezer bag for up to 3 months. To thaw, unwrap them and let them sit at room temperature on a rack for about 20 minutes, or pop in a 350°F oven for about 10 minutes.