Quick Hokkaido Milk Bread Buns
This is the first time I’ve baked bread down here in Fort Lauderdale Florida while on vacation. I wasn’t planning on baking so didn’t bring any starter with me. I met with Alfanso while down here and he was kind enough to have given me some osmotolerant yeast from his stash that he got from Amazon. So while having bread baking withdrawal I decided that I’d bake some bread. We are having a small group of good friends over for dinner tonight and took the chance to bake buns to go with dinner. Who doesn’t like freshly baked buns with their dinner?
Now any baker who has baked bread in an unfamiliar oven will know it’s challenges. Add to that challenge I am also using commercial yeast I’ve never used before along with flour I’ve never used. Another challenge is the fact that I am preparing an enriched dough to take advantage of the osmotolerant yeast yet do not have a stand mixer down here so will have to fully hand mix the dough.
Despite those challenges the buns look pretty good, but the taste and texture will be the final verdict on whether or not this was a successful bake.
I love the texture and flavour of Hokkaido milk bread so decided to make a fully white flour version for this bake. This is my formula which makes 12 good sized buns or one 9x4x4” pullman loaf without lid. Either way you get a lot of lift and tall buns or a tall loaf.
Tangzhong
25g - King Arthur AP flour
125g - milk
The classic ratio in tangzhong 1:5
Final dough
371 g KA AP flour and 29 g to mix blend with butter when mixing by hand
50 g granulated sugar
150 g 1% milk
1 egg
2 Tbsp room temperature butter (29 g) Mix with 29 g of flour
2 tsp - instant yeast
1/2 tsp salt
All of the tangzhong mixture
egg wash: 1 yolk and 1 tbsp milk, beaten…
Cook Tangzhong mixing flour and milk constantly until it becomes a thick roux. Let cool before adding to final dough. Or add to cold milk and egg to cool it down.
Blend room temperature butter and flour together and set aside to incorporate after the dough is well developed.
Whisk together dry ingredients flour salt and yeast.
To mix by hand, add the salt and yeast to the wet ingredients (milk, tangzhong and egg) to dissolve. Next add the flour and mix with a silicone spatula until no dry flour remains. Rest 10 mins. Next perform French folds until the dough is well developed. Smear the blended butter/flour onto the dough and then fold to incorporate and then perform further French folds until well developed. Form into a tight ball and place in a bowl covered with plastic or a damp cloth and place in a warm place until doubled (about 1hr 20 mins).
Butter a large baking pan, or crumple your parchment paper and then line the pan. Punch the dough down and then divide into 12 equal portions. Form each into tight boules. Place in the buttered baking pan seem side down. Cover them and allow them to fully proof about 1 hour 20-30 mins, they should pass the poke test.
After about 30 mins of proofing time, whisk your remaining egg and milk and then brush the small boules.
About 30 mins prior to end of final proof preheat the oven to 350°F.
Immediately prior to baking brush the dough again with the egg and milk mixture.
Bake the rolls uncovered for 30-35 minutes or until the internal temperature is at least 190F. Cover if your rolls get brown early in the baking process. For one loaf the baking time may need to be extended to 35-40 mins and I would remove the loaf from the pan and place it back in the oven directly on the rack for another 5-10 mins to stiffen the crust so that the loaf doesn’t collapse from its weight and height.
Remove the bread from the oven but not the pans, brush the tops with butter while hot, and then let cool for 10 minutes before pulling the bread from the pans. You may need to slide a butter knife down the sides of the pan to loosen the bread, but I have found parchment paper to be unnecessary. Sprinkle with fleur de sel if you wish after brushing with butter.
Comments
Hm… well they are! Brave are you to face so many unknowns! Bet they taste great. Hope you are having a great month and that your shoulder is mending well. c
Thank you Caroline. We are making the most of our vacation. After an excruciating day of pain post steroid injection my shoulder pain has greatly disappeared. Now I just need to do my physiotherapy regularly and hopefully my range of motion will gradually increase as it is very limited at the moment. But, I am glad that the worst of the pain is now gone, thanks for asking.
Benny
They look puffy! Glad you can enjoy some warm vacation. I don't mind cold days so much as the sun tends to be bright and hot, but I did take a tumble a couple weeks ago on some ridged ice in an alley and that's been a bit nasty even now. When they say "the bigger they are, the harder they fall" they aren't kidding :)
Glad you can enjoy company, too. Stay safe!
Thank you David, I hope your injury from falling isn’t too bad. Ice can be so treacherous this time of year. Fortunately the weather was warm enough last evening that we were able to keep the balcony door open the whole evening. Also we have only socialized indoors with people who have had three doses of the vaccine. I know that isn’t a 100% guarantee but at least it reduces our risks somewhat.
Benny
Vacation should include baking in my book. Hope FLA is treating you well. Just wanted to let you know that my rye starter was left untouched in the fridge for three months and it revived to good as ever after one feeding. So no worries unless you left it at a truck stop.
Don
You’re very right Don about vacations including baking, I was going through withdrawal so the dinner party was a perfect reason to bake something.
I once had my whole red fife starter develop mold during a 3 week vacation so I’ve always had that worry when I’m away. From what many have said here there should be little to worry about with the rye starter. Given the treatment I gave it, I’m very hopeful it will be fine, that and the fact that I also have dried frozen starter as a back up.
Benny
I'm impressed, Benny. Improvisation must be a sign of a good baker. I can't imagine how you mixed the dough with a bad shoulder. I bet your friends devoured the buns in no time.
Richard
Thank you Richard. My frozen shoulder is less painful now and one doens’t need much range of motion to do slap and folds. This dough required 800 or so slap and folds to fully develop! Our guests were quite pleased with the meal including the buns. I kind of missed the whole grain but didn’t want to buy that much flour that wouldn’t get used and go bad before our next visit. It was fun getting to use KA flour which I’ve seen used so much but of course don’t have access to in Canada. It doesn’t seem much different to Robin Hood flour in performance. It didn’t absorb as much milk but that is more likely to be the Florida humidity than the flour.
Benny
These were definitely a success. Because I made 12 buns we still had five leftover from last night. We now only have two.
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Excited to read about your holiday break bake. Good choice of recipe to make, especially if you don't have a dutch oven or all your pans and nice to see the Benny (TM) hokkaido in a different format, not only a different shape but also without any wholewheat either!
-Jon
Thank you Jon, you’re right I don’t have the baking instruments down here in Florida. No baking stone/steel or a dutch oven. In fact I don’t have a bowl scraper. I did buy a bench scraper. The next trip down I’ll bring a bowl scraper down since I have three and don’t need three back home.
Benny