My Joe! It's a Homemade Sloppy Joe + Bun!

3/15/09: Sloppy Joe's with Homemade Hamburger Buns

• Sources: The Sloppy Joe recipe is from Rachael Ray on foodtv.com and the hamburger bun recipe came from recipezaar.com.

• Defining moments: 1st time to use a recipe from the Food Network channel and 1st time to make homemade hamburger buns.

• What I learned: I never thought of making my own hamburger buns so when I found the bun recipe at the bottom of the page on recipezaar.com, I knew then and there that I will be using them this Sunday. It is a known fact that you can take a store bought bun and mush it into a small ball within seconds. (Hey, I've seen it done many a time on those Food Network hot dog eating competitions.) So I knew from the beginning that if I had Sloppy Joe's in mind I was going to have to send in the big artillery, aka a bun that can stand up to a heavy, wet sauce.

I learned from making the buns that they don't rise much while baking. So I should form the buns as big as I want the baked version to be. I also noticed that the dough was not that easy to form, it is quite sticky and wet and took at least 10 minutes to knead. There's a lot of liquid in this recipe (eggs, water, oil) so it is understandable.
I learned from making the Sloppy Joe's that it is VERY important to taste as you add the strong flavorings, such as the Worcestershire and A1 sauces that I used. It is a better practice to add teeny-weeny amounts of these types of flavorings, in order to not overpower the whole dish, than to just follow the recipe. Taste it every step of the way.
I changed Rachael's recipe ingredients for the Sloppy Joe's, so here is my ingredient list: 4 lb. ground beef, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 3 tbsp. A1 steak sauce, 2 medium onions, 1 bell pepper, 6 tbsp. Worcestershire sauce, and 8 cups tomato sauce.

• How it tasted: Both the buns and the sauce were great, according to me and the whole family. Papa said this was the best Sloppy Joe sauce he ever had and my youngest sister said that she likes it, and she happens to not like ground beef much. The bun held up nicely and didn't become goulash in the end. :)

• How about a 2nd time? Why, uh, yeah! Definitely. And I am looking forward to making a hot dog bun shape.