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Trinidad Hops Bread (recipe)

8 December 2006 2,817 views 54 Comments

Trinidad Hops Bread

Oh sweet sweet blogosphere. Does my devotion have no end!? It’s the middle of the night and I have a sudden hankering for Hops! Now what is hops? I am sure for most of you you are thinking about some kind of grain and the beermaking process. No no no no no no. Hops is the most basic of breakfast breads/buns here in Trinidad. I have no idea how it got its name, maybe it has to do with the lengthy yeast development stage before flour is added? Its distinctive smell, taste and shape I think are some of the earliest memories of morning for many a Trini child. I know that there was a ‘Hops man’ who visited my Aunt’s area and I would love to be at her home when he arrived with his freshly baked batch! So now that I am up and I have gotten a few hits already looking for a Hops recipe I thought hmmm why not make some tonight. I am sure it will be a welcome morning surprise for my parents as well :) lol

Note: Even though Hops is traditionally made solely with white flour, my family always adds wholewheat to everything (health benefits people!) so my Hops Recipe reflects this. I think it gives it a lovely nuttiness while keeping the light airiness that you expect from such a roll :)


Hops Bread (adapted from the Naparima Girls Cookbook)

1 package dry yeast
2 tsp sugar
1 tbsp melted shortening
4 cups white flour
2 cups wholewheat flour
2 1/2 cups warm water
2 tsp salt

1. Pour warm water into a large bowl
2. Dissolve sugar in water
3. Dissolve yeast over sugar and water and allow to develop for 10 minutes
4. Stir yeast mixture with a fork and add melted shortening
5. Gradually stir in flour and salt.
6. Knead for 8 to 10 minutes adding flour if necessary to make a medium stiff dough

7. Grease bowl and top of dough, cover and allow to rest for 20-25 minutes
8. Punch down dough, form in balls, place on greased trays

9. Cover with a damp cloth and allow to rise until doubled (1 – 1.5 hours)

10. Bake in a 400F oven for 15 minutes

Makes 12-14 hops

54 Comments »

  • Chennette said:

    Yay – a hops recipe! Just the thing for this weekend, as my sister has gone and posted bread and channa pics on her Flickr!

    # 8 December 2006 at 7:33 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    o niceness! :D i saw the maleeda (sp?) on yours? i never knew that was the name ! i love that thing real bad :D i’ll link to it lolz! where is your sis flickr? :) is she in trini? :)

    # 8 December 2006 at 7:44 pm | link
  • maggie said:

    Hooray!! I’ve been hankering for hops bread lately; the last time I had it I was twelve, and we used to drive to Butterflake Bakery (in Marabella, I think?) to get them. There’s nothing like cold butter melting inside a warm hops bread, and sometimes we’d get red pork and black pudding to eat with it. Heaven!

    Next time my sister’s over, I am definitely trying this recipe; I need her here because I can’t knead bread worth a damn. *g*

    # 8 December 2006 at 7:58 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    LOLZ! Let me know how it turns out Maggie :D I finished baking these at around 5:30 this morning (yes madness i know, but ‘when yuh ketch ah vaps!’) and that first slab of butter drenching the insides was heaven in my mouth!!! :D

    # 8 December 2006 at 8:29 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    My sister currently only has her mobile phone for photography, but she is torturing me anyway from back home in Trinidad. http://www.flickr.com/photos/lilandra.
    And oh, whenever hops was hot, we’d get a quart and a half, and all of us in the car on the way home would polish off the half, ripping out the sweet fluffy insides to savour, then demolishing the crustiness of the outsides. We finish the hops before we got home, whether we bought it in San Juan on the way to Central, or from Couva proper.

    # 8 December 2006 at 10:54 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    i think there is some culinary version of crack in those fluffy insides :D i eat them to bursting :D

    # 8 December 2006 at 11:41 pm | link
  • Veron said:

    When I was living in the Philippines, we ate bread for breakfast and late evening. It’s this bread called pandesal. It’s always so good to get them nice and hot from the bakery. I can just smell the aroma right now from your pictures!

    # 9 December 2006 at 10:59 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    How interesting Veron :) I will look up this pandesal now :) Thanks for dropping by! :D

    # 9 December 2006 at 1:37 pm | link
  • shaheen said:

    Hi , i am new to ur site and it has so many interesting recipes!This bread seems similar to the no knead bread.Is it? BTW, do u have a recipe for a sweet potato pone?

    # 9 December 2006 at 10:56 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    Hi Shaheen, I am loving your site too! :D Hops is not that similar to the no knead bread I don’t think? Well the preparation is quite different for one. But I have not made the no knead bread yet, so maybe in taste and texture they are similar, but I’m guessing not at this point :) I do have a recipe for Sweet Potato Pone :) I will email it to you, and will be posting it soon :) Thanks for visiting :) !

    # 10 December 2006 at 1:16 am | link
  • Lilandra said:

    i just googled…pandesal is… Pan de Sal!!
    *sigh*
    Have you ever looked at a Filipino map? It’s so much fun looking at place names and such!

    # 15 January 2007 at 1:48 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    Lilandra – that’s like when one day i was lying down and it hit me that parasol was Para Sol … :lol:

    # 15 January 2007 at 2:31 am | link
  • Lilandra said:

    lololol

    i searched on flickr and it really does look like hops

    # 15 January 2007 at 2:46 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    Lilandra – flickr is fun :)

    # 15 January 2007 at 3:07 am | link
  • Lilandra said:

    yes
    i spend many hours at work searching for chocolate and cupcakes and pizza and stuff
    :)

    or browsing thru camera finder cuz i don’t got a camera yet

    # 15 January 2007 at 3:28 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    Lilandra – when yuh gettin’ camera? :)

    # 15 January 2007 at 3:50 am | link
  • Lilandra said:

    i dunno. never :-(

    # 15 January 2007 at 5:50 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    Lilandra – nah, you go get it soon :)

    # 15 January 2007 at 7:59 am | link
  • Lilandra said:

    i hope so
    oh well
    i am learning to take pix with a camera phone…a very impressive skill
    how else will i take pix when i make hajj
    hehehe

    # 15 January 2007 at 8:58 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    Lilandra – you will have new camera for hajj :)

    # 15 January 2007 at 9:12 pm | link
  • Marsha said:

    This is even harder than the biscuits for me!

    # 17 January 2007 at 2:54 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    Marsha – we go have to make a baking lime!!! :D

    # 17 January 2007 at 2:59 pm | link
  • Marsha said:

    Yeh but how you learn to bake? From watching yuh mudder?

    # 17 January 2007 at 3:17 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    Marsha – muahahaha my mother don’t bake… well she did years ago… but i never watched her… i dunno… it just kinda happened.. my first few attempts were doorstops… :lol: trial and error til i found something that worked for me :)

    # 17 January 2007 at 3:25 pm | link
  • Marsha said:

    Ok I feel justified in being jealous LOL :)

    # 17 January 2007 at 3:40 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    Marsha – steupz :P

    # 17 January 2007 at 3:47 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    So occasionally I reread your posts :-)
    And I just checked out the pandesal pics on Flickr – so, is the “Pan de Sal” related to Bajan Salt Bread? Some of the pics look like salt bread and some look crustier, like hops. So very interesting. I supposed to be sleeping but now I want to search. Sleep…surf…sleep…search…sigh.

    # 14 April 2007 at 1:11 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    i dunno this salt bread of which you speak :D

    # 16 April 2007 at 11:10 am | link
  • Chennette said:

    It’s not salty. At all. But not sweet either. Just bread, baked up in a big sort of oval shape – supposed to be a single serving roll, but they’re more like twice that I think.
    Recipe here – http://www.totallybarbados.com/barbados/About_Barbados/Local_Information/Barbados_Food/Barbados_Recipes/4119.htm

    # 16 April 2007 at 11:39 am | link
  • Chennette said:

    Looking all over for a picture – Cynthia had one! http://tastesofguyana.blogspot.com/2007/03/these-are-few.html

    # 16 April 2007 at 11:47 am | link
  • Sarina said:

    hehe yuh mashin up d threadz :D lol :D i’ll bookmark that recipe to try :D !

    # 16 April 2007 at 12:13 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    My brain is fried from cricket in the sun yesterday – not a passing cloud in Kensington.
    Hmm, how many more excuses can I come up with when I forget to “Reply to Thread” ;-)

    # 16 April 2007 at 12:21 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    what/where is kensington? that is b’dos or guyana? this cup still going on ? whatwhat?

    # 16 April 2007 at 2:43 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    ooooo!

    # 16 April 2007 at 2:59 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    Kensington Oval is in Little England of course, Barbados. We still only in the 2nd round of CWC.

    # 16 April 2007 at 3:44 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    oh … can you detect my interest level? :lol:

    # 16 April 2007 at 3:56 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    Oh completely – your fascination simply leaps from the page. Which is why I stand by, prepared to keep you updated and answer any niggling queries you may have. Why I can begin, right here, right now, an exposition on the current Aus v Sri match. I only await your signal ;-)

    # 16 April 2007 at 4:03 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    how come your name/icon doesn’t show on my bloglog reader roll :cry: ?

    # 16 April 2007 at 5:06 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    Hmmm…I can see it. Don’t know what’s up.

    # 16 April 2007 at 6:51 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    do you have it set to be invisi on my site (clicking the red square) ? :(

    # 16 April 2007 at 7:15 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    Is it working now? I don’t know anything about an invisible box/setting

    # 16 April 2007 at 7:35 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    no :( you still hidden away :( if you hover your mouse over your icon in the reader’s roll itwill tell you to click to hide/unhide… :*(

    # 16 April 2007 at 8:27 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    http://www.mybloglog.com/buzz/members/mem_hidelist.php

    # 16 April 2007 at 9:03 pm | link
  • Chennette said:

    hovered my mouse and it asked if I wanted to be invisible, and I didn’t so didn’t click the X
    and this link says “There is currently no hide list.”
    Sigh.

    # 16 April 2007 at 9:05 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    i’ll report it as a bug :cry: … i wanna see chennette :D

    # 16 April 2007 at 10:23 pm | link
  • ejm said:

    Your hops look delicious, Sarina. Just to clarify, is a packet of yeast about 2+1/2tsp? And does your recipe make 9 or 18 hops?

    -Elizabeth

    # 22 May 2007 at 5:15 pm | link
  • Sarina said:

    thanks Elizabeth :D Yes a packet of yeast is approx the 2.5 tsp size :) My recipe made 12-14 hops :)

    # 22 May 2007 at 6:12 pm | link
  • Ramona Ramdeen said:

    The hops was good but how about the receipe for currents roll

    # 24 July 2007 at 10:33 pm | link
  • Rea Rahaman said:

    do you have the receipe for doubles? I would very much like a copy. thank you

    # 5 September 2007 at 7:01 pm | link
  • MARLON said:

    Question?

    Do you have a recipe for butter bread?

    Your response would be appreciated

    ty

    # 23 October 2007 at 1:02 am | link
  • Sweet said:

    So *this* is the recipe I’ve been looking for! Every reciped I tried tastes nothing like what mom used to make. She always made bread but I never knew it was called “hops” bread. Interesting. I shall try this recipe.

    # 8 November 2007 at 12:37 pm | link
  • sweetrini said:

    Hi everyone happy holidays to u and family I did try the baking this recipe using whole wheat flour and I make the long bread and my bf love the way it came out so now I am baking bread for him every weekend

    # 30 December 2007 at 5:38 pm | link
  • Lilandra said:

    since you don’t get trackbacks…mom made hops:

    http://lilandra.com/blog/archives/2008/06/15/mom-made-hops-bread/

    # 16 June 2008 at 12:18 am | link
  • Sarina (author) said:

    Lilandra – nyam! :) wish i knew how to fix the trackbacks… been trying for over a year… it’s intermittent :(

    # 16 June 2008 at 11:21 am | link

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