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Friday, March 08, 2013

Japanese Melon Pan

My love for 'Melon Pan' started when my japanese friend, Mio, brought the melon pan to a farewell party. I can tell you, it was such a good first impression. Several days ago, we had a babyshower party and this time, Wakana-san brought the Melon Pan.

I believe it was fate. So I asked the recipe from Wakana-san, and she kindly invited me to make the Melon Pan together at her house. It was so nice of her!


So then we baked together, and produced 16 buns. I brought 6 of them home, and they were all gone in one day (it was my husband to blame). Wrapped by the cookie dough, the bread is sweet and crisp on the outside, and fluffy on the inside.

The next day, I put my guilty feeling aside, and started baking one batch. That's how much I love it! ;)

For those of you who want to give it a try, here is the recipe from my friend, Wakana. I felt the dough was too sticky, so I added about 1/2 cup flour from the original recipe. And since I use kitchenaid mixer instead of bread machine, I adjusted the recipe.

Japanese Melon Pan (Japanese Style Sweet Bread)
makes 16 buns

Ingredients:
For the bread
300 gr bread flour
40 gr sugar
150 gr water+1 egg
24 gr unsalted butter
6 gr active dry yeast
50 gr warm water for yeast mixture

For the cookie
60 gr unsalted butter
85 gr sugar
40 gr egg
180 gr all-purpose flour (I add 1/2 cup more)
1/2 tsp baking powder
granulated sugar (for sprinkles)

Directions:
For the cookie:
- For the cookie: Whip butter until it becomes white. Add beaten egg
- Combine all purpose flour, baking powder, and sugar. Add to the butter and egg mixture
- Wrap cookie dough like a stick. Put it into the refrigerator or the freezer

For the bread:
- Prepare the warm mater and add yeast into it. Wait until it's foamy for about 15 minutes.
- Combine all the dry ingredients in the bowl of stand mixer: bread flour and sugar.
- Run the mixer for 1 minute to mix the dry ingredients.
- Add the egg mixture, unsalted butter, and yeast mixture.
- Use the kneading attachment and run the mixer for 5-10 minutes until the dough is smooth
- Shape the dough into a bowl and let it sit in the bowl (covered with plastic wrap) for 1 hour until it doubles in size
- Divide the dough into 16 pieces of equal size.
- Round each dough and cover them with a wet towel. Wait 15 minutes.
- Take the cookie dough out of the fridge, then divide the cookie dough into 16 pieces of equal size.
- Reround each bread dough.
- Sandwich the cookie dough with two plastic wraps, and spread it to make it like a round disk.
- Remove the upper wrap from the cookie dough and put the bread dough on it.
- Take upside down and remove the other wrap. Stick the cookie dough on the bread dough.
- Mark the cookie dough with a knife.
- Dip the wrapped bread into the granulated sugar.
- Spray water on the dough. Wait 20 min.
- Spray water again. Preheat oven to 210C (410F). Bake in preheated oven for 10-12 minutes.