20% Rye Sourdough Shokupan Sandwich Bread

My best attempt yet in my quest to make the fluffiest, shreddiest healthy-ish whole grain imbued shokupan: this 20% Rye Shokupan.

Recipe is adapted from Benito's Mochi SD Hokkaido Milk Bread recipe, a great recipe - all props to benito.

Because I am lazy I cut some steps to simplify the process a bit - namely, I poured boiling water directly from my kettle instead of heating up milk (I know - it changes the composition somewhat) and I baked the bread all in one step instead of taking it out of the tin for further baking. I also had more sourdough starter to use up so I modified the stiff sweet starter amounts.

Aside from that, the main difference is the use of whole grain rye flour for the tangzhong/yudane. This bread I am quite pleased with but later attempts to raise the rye flour content were unsuccessful - gah! I really hope to develop a high-percentage super shreddy rye bread...one day...

The hardest part of making this bread is getting the proofing right. Almost all of my shokupan failures come from overproofing. I find shokupan dough to be much less forgiving than other lean doughs, which I can chuck in the fridge if I need to go out. Further thoughts and written recipe/recipe card here on my blog, or you can follow benito's recipe above and just change the mochiko to rye.