Buns

Buns

YIPPEEEEEEEEEEE! Do you see those babies in the picture above? Yes, i baked them with my own hands. i am over the moon. You would wonder what is so great about baking buns. After all, i am not the first person who did it or who came up with the recipe. But, let me bask in the glorious sunshine of this culinary high. i can bake good cakes. But anything involving yeast was a big no-no. Though i love eating living things (dead living things, please) i was wary of trying something that involved the active participation of another living organism – in this case yeast. i have never seen yeast before in my life till i opened the can of dried active yeast yesterday.

i wanted a recipe for sweet buns and found one but it had the measurements in grams instead of cups. i was too lazy to do the conversion and decided to search for another one. i ultimately found one recipe i like here. i made some slight modifications – used milk instead of water and added more sugar and butter. Since it was my first time using yeast, i was very unsure of the end result. i should not have worried because the buns were beautiful and tasty. Ask my husband if you don’t believe me!

The recipe is from here with my little modifications.

Things you need:

1 cup and 3 tablespoons warm milk

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

2 1/2 tablespoons sugar

1/4 cup sugar

2 large eggs

3 cups bread flour

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

The method:

Whisk the milk, yeast and 2 1/2 tablespoons sugar. The milk should be warm (but not hot or you will end up murdering the yeast) – i microwaved it for a minute and half. Put the mixture in a warm place and let the yeast re-activate. It will get foamy in about 10 minutes (or maybe 5 if the temperature is right).

In a large bowl, whisk the flour with the salt. Add the softened butter and rub into flour. Stir in the yeast mixture and one beaten egg. This will result in a very sticky dough. Now comes the hard part. Turn the sticky dough onto a well-floured surface and knead and knead for about 25 minutes – the recipe said 10 minute but the dough was still sticky and very uncooperative well past 10 minutes. i  despaired after 5 minutes, my muscles all worn and droopy and i nearly gave up. But having woken up the husband early from his evening siesta just so i could wrestle with dough, i could not give up. Almost sweating (when the temperature outside was hovering around 0 degree) and cursing, i kneaded and kneaded till i got the dough to behave itself and tamed it to a smooth texture.

The hard part is over. Now shape the dough into a ball and cover with cling film and let it rest in a warm place till it doubles . It took about an hour (i thought of keeping the bowl on top of the heater but worried it would topple over, i put it in the boiler room).

Punch the air out of the dough – this is the fun part! Line the baking sheet with parchment paper (no parchment paper so i used aluminium foil!). Divide the dough into equal portions and gently roll into balls. Cover tray loosely with cling film and let the buns rise for about an hour.

Preheat oven to 205 degree centigrades and put a shallow bowl of water on the oven floor. Brush the buns with eggwash (one egg beaten with water- this will give the buns a nice glossy look). Bake for about 15 minutes or till the tops turn golden brown. Don’t forget to turn the tray halfway through baking.  400 degrees with rack in center. Beat remaining egg with one tablespoon water and brush some on top of buns. Sprinkle with sesame seeds, if using. Bake, turning sheet halfway through baking, until tops are golden brown, about 15 minutes. Transfer to a rack to cool completely.

Now, i must mention that i had to be physically restrained by my husband from diving inside the oven and retrieving the buns – they looked so pretty and i just wanted to take them out and keep staring at them. They were so freaking good – i sang praises to the Goddess who made them (that is me in case you get the idea that i was praising some other culinary goddess!) as i dunked them in my morning tea (i plead guilty to the shameful pleasure of dunking biscuits, bread and the like in my tea).

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Before the trip to the oven

Straight from the oven