Polo Bun Revisited

Nutella Flower Bread

There are several Youtube videos making this bread and all of them are pretty good but i find that Steve's Kitchen is clear and his instruction is easy to follow. I have changed the bread recipe and used a bread machine to make the dough.  The result is a lovely googy sweet bread which is too pretty to break up and devout, but who can resist, the fragrance perfumed the whole house.

Puff Pastry Topping Pork Floss Roll

I have tried so many sweet bread recipes for rolls and buns and non has failed. When i want to make sweet bread but am lazy to look for the complicated recipes, meaning recipes using different methods like tangzhung method etc, i will go for this straight method.  Lately i have been making sweet bread with the sponge method as the texture is so much softer with a bite which the straight method lacks.  Instead of making a simple filled sweet roll this time, I topped the roll with a piece of puff pastry and nori, and this really kick up this sweet roll a couple of notches. 

Popovers

Can you believe the end of the year is already here? It has gone by so quickly, with a blink of an eye, a few pinches of this, a handful of that and lots of sprinkles with  garnished passion, this year has gone by under my nose, but a new year of hope and prosperity awaits.  A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR to all family and friends.

I find that making POPOVERS at the end of the year is appropriate, POP the old year and bring OVER the goodness to the new year to come.

The popover is an American version of Yorkshire pudding in England. These impressive popovers have only a few humble ingredients - eggs, milk, flour, salt and butter and they make your meal special.  Made well they should have large crowns, lightly crisp. golden brown exteriors and tender, moist, airy interiors crisscrossed with custardy webs of dough.  This recipe is adapted from America's Test Kitchen and unlike most popover batters, this one is smooth, not lumpy.  HIGH HEAT is crucial to the speedy, high rise of these popovers. 

Pumpkin Cinnamon Christmas Tree Bread

I got up early on Christmas Eve to make this bread so that i can post the recipe and wish all family and friends a very Merry Christmas but i had a problem with my computer and am not able to do so until now.  Sorry about the late wishes but the bread turned out so well and the fragrance of Christmas filled the whole house and woke everyone up earlier than usual.  I am sharing how this bread is shaped and to WISH YOU ALL A MERRY CHRISTMAS, HAPPY HOLIDAYS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Conchas/Mexican Buns

Have you ever felt like you have been burned out from blogging?  After blogging for so many years, since 2005, i felt like i am running out of juice.  Lately, i have a lot of aches and pains,  my friend said that i could be suffering from 'A G E', i asked if it was serious and she gave me a straight face which made me want to run to ER and ask if i really have 'A G E'.  I felt so silly when she broke up and laughed her heart out, then she said that i am not young any more and that struck me that she was pulling my leg, yes, i am suffering from 'age'.  After 6 decades of standing improperly, the poor muscles must be off-balanced and causing all these aches and pains.  I am not defeated yet, running out of juice maybe but, i am still cooking and baking.  

I love making sweet breads and when we were in Cancun, Mexico, i saw these attractive bread selling in all the bakeries there and had to look for the recipe.  This attractive bread is Conchas, they are Mexican shell-shaped pastries.  The lightly sweet bread has a sugar-shell pattern on top.  “Conchas” have existed since the early 1930s as it was cited in print in Texas newspapers, so we don't have to go to Mexico to enjoy these bread, just go to TEXAS, but TEXAS is 14 - 18 hours away, so i have to make some and i did.  I made them with this sweet bread recipe which have never failed to produce the best sweet bread ever.  This recipe has been passed on to all my friends and they all loved it, it has now been like a song lyrics to me when anyone wants the recipe.  

Greek Olga Bread

We had a family outing to the zoo and had lunch at a Greek Restaurant nearby.  What do you eat in a Greek Restaurant?  Gyros with Pita/Olga Bread of course.  The grandchildren loved the Pita/Olga bread so much that i had to make some for them at home.

Smile Pau/Bao Improved Final

What a surprise!!!  I have finally managed to get into Blogger after some mind blogging tasks, so early in the morning, brain is still in the sleeping mode.  I am staring at the new format and my brain is trying to get accustomed it.  I tried loading pictures as i have promised to show before steaming and after steaming the paus/baos and i am delighted to find out that i am now able to select several pictures at one time, just like it used to be, a long time ago.  Thank you Blogger, for bringing back this feature.  


Below, i have numbered every pau/bao that i have pleated and took a picture of it before steaming it and then another picture of it after steaming.  I have tried my best to figure out how to get a uniform smile but these paus/baos have a mind of their own, they will smile however they like and with attitude.  Which Smile do you like?  I like the one that split uniformly like a blossom and i have found that if i gather the pleats neatly , it will and might split like blossom.  The ones that i twisted, split like the map of the world, it is not so easy to pleat with this recipe as the dough is so soft.  Need many credit hours and that too might not ensure that it will work despite all the practice.    Well, at least they cracked and the taste is there, accept it lily, they are hand-made and rustic.

Smile Pau/Bao Improved Continuation

 As promised, i am sharing how to finish making the pau/bao.  In my next post i will share pictures of the pleated paus/bao before steaming and after steaming.

Starter Dough for Smile Char Siew Pau/Bao


i had wanted to share this step-by-step procedure from the beginning to end with a finished smiling pau/bao but blogger did not cooperate.  I loaded all the pictures and was about to select them, boom, it took me somewhere and i lost all the pictures loaded.  I am not going to load them again, cos blogger does not allow mutiple loading and i had to load, one at a time.  I hope someone can help me load multiple like how it used to be.  Anyway, so i decided to post this procedure by sections, starting from the starter.  I started the starter on March 7th, 2012 when i made the first batch of smile pau/bao.  I will keep a little or rather what was not needed and added 2 cups of pau flour and enough of water to make into a soft dough.  I have found that i could make the pau/bao smile although the starter did not foam and smell sour. 

Greek Easter Bread/Tsoureki

Tsoureki, a rich sweet yeast bread with a proud tradition, is made of eggs, milk, and butter, is a staple during Greek Easter. The three-strand braid symbolizes the Holy Trinity, while the red-dyed hard-boiled egg braided into the dough symbolizes the blood of Christ. I know there’s a lot poured into it and since it is the ending of Lent and being able to eat well again, this delicious bread ought to be served.  AuthenticTsoureki is flavored with orange and a delightful spice called Mahlab (also called Mahlepi) that is ground from the pits of wild cherries.  I did not make an authentic tsoureki but i did bake a beautiful bread that put a smile in everyone's faces when they looked at it and you should see their eyes rolling will glee when they were eating this soft bread.  Happy Easter and a lovely weekend.

Smile Pau/Bao

Smile though your heart is aching
Smile, even though it's breaking
When there are clouds, in the sky, you'll get by
If you smile, through your fear and sorrow
Smile, and there'll be tomorrow
You'll see the sun come shining through
If you'll....


Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear, may be ever so near,
That's the time, you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile,
If you'll just....


Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear, may be ever so near,
That's the time, you must keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile,
If you'll just....


Smile

I hope you all enjoyed this video and sang along with the lyrics as the lyrics of yesteryears are so meaningful.  Smile is a very powerful tool, even a pau/bao that smiles will make your day.  It is easier to make me SMILE but not so easy to make the pau/bao smile.  It took me 2 days and many paus/baos after, to be able to make them Smiling.  It is not the recipe, any recipe will work if we are able to recognize the function of each ingredients in the recipe.  I have edited this recipe and omitted the wheat starch and replaced it with pau flour as i have found that too much starch makes the dough tasted gummy and stick to the teeth.  The wheat starch write-up is for your knowledge only.

Velvety Sauce Char Siew Pau/Bao

I have to share this Velvety sauce as this sauce kicked the Char Siew Pau/Bao up a few knotches and moved it to my favorite, will not go back to my older recipe.  The recipe for the sauce makes a fairly large batch and it is worth the while cos it will keep well in the fridge and every time you want to make Char Siew Pau/Bao, half the work is done if you have Char Siew and all you have to do is to make the Pau/Bao dough.  Talking about Pau/Bao Dough, i get all excited when i see a new recipe and what a let- down to the excitement when the result is not up to my expectation.  I still fall back to SuperSoft Pau and if you are lazy and do not want to make the Tangzhong, go ahead and follow Tien Tsin Pau recipe or Pan Fried Pau, they are very good pau doughs which my picky pau eater, Renee approves.

I am posting the Velvety Sauce as the Ingredients and Method for making the Pau/Bao Dough are already posted in the 3 links i have provided above.  You can make
Char Siew following these 2 recipes - Char Siew and Lam Yee Char Siew

Christmas Star Bread

Christmas has come and i would like to thank all my family, friends and readers for their support. I have baked a Christmas Star Bread as the Christmas Star is so very special and magical. Although this bread does not shine but it does light up my heart to see the smiles in the family when it was presented to be shared. Thank you Feeding My Enthusiasms for your inspiration.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Koledna Pitka Bulgarian Christmas Bread

I had wanted to bake something Chrismas and instead of heading the cookie way, decided to make bread   I know that bread is baked and shared on Chrismas time in most european countries.  I googled and found this recipe which looked easy.  I fell in love with it the moment i set eyes on the google image of this bread.  This bread recipe is from Easteuropeanfood.about.com and it says that this bread is typically eaten on Christmas Eve and throughout the holidays. There are many ways to shape this bread, but I think this sunflower look is most festive and i agree totally,  Often, a silver coin is tucked inside and the one to find it should expect good luck in the coming year,  I do not own a silver coin, so it was omitted, guessed we would have to expect good luck in another way.  This recipe requires only one rise and since i used the breadmachine, the dough had a first rise in the breadmachine and another before baking, in this case, more could be better, i hope i am right.  The bread turned out so deliciously pretty that i think i can feel the good luck by just looking at it.