Fluffy Milk Cinnamon Raisin Rolls and Coconut Custard Bread Using Tangzhong Water Roux

This wasn't the bread I was planning on baking when I got up on Sunday morning. I spent the entire week formulating a recipe to replicate the Muesli Morning Rounds from Ozery Bakery.  You know that small piece of yummy flat bread Starbucks includes in their Protein Bistro Boxes? I picked up a bag of it from Sprouts and as I bit into one, I thought "this can't be too difficult to make." I read the ingredients and I started jotting down a recipe. 

I knew it was too late on Sunday evening to start baking bread. The forecast called for rain again over the weekend. I spent the week researching substitutes for a few ingredients I knew I would not be able to get. The ingredients were mainly natural dough enhancers and preservatives.  I wanted the fluffy texture of the Ozery bread but I couldn't find cultured wheat starch anywhere.  During my search I ran across a recipe for fluffy Asian bread using water roux called tangzhong.

I remember using the tangzhong water roux method  a few times but it's been a few years.  I dug up an old recipe for Hokkaido milk bread.  You can basically use tangzhong in almost any bread recipe by calculating a percentage of flour and water for the water roux. I started off baking hamburger buns on Saturday because we needed buns for our turkey burgers. It turned out really well, except I was impatient and didn't let the first batch rise enough before baking.  I was hoping for more oven spring.

I bookmarked three bread recipes.  Two were healthy and the third was decadent. On Sunday morning, I woke up undecided.  I asked hubby which of the three I should bake. Cook's Illustrated multigrain bread using 7 grain cereal, my untested Ozery muesli morning rounds recipe, or a cinnamon raisin milk bread using the split braid/twist method that Chris Kimball used for his cinnamon raisin bread. I guess cinnamon raisin sounds a lot better than multigrain and muesli.

I had healthy intentions all week. I even did the whole meal prep thing all week.  I have about 5 pounds that I want to lose and bread is one of my greatest weaknesses.  I did manage to give half of it to my dad and this morning I ate two hard boiled eggs and gave the bread I packed to one of my coworkers.

I forgot how much I love soft and fluffy Asian bread.  Make this milk bread.  Make it plain without any filling and without any complicated rolling or braiding.  It is amazing eaten warm out of the oven or toasted over the next few days. Or be a little adventurous and fill it with taro, azuki beans, coconut, ube, cinnamon raisins, or just raisins. Wrap pieces of the dough around a hot dog.

In my house, the cinnamon raisin has better label appeal.  The grandparents prefer it filled with taro paste. My favorite is coconut. The coconut filling is yummy.  The recipe below makes a smaller amount of coconut filling that adds a subtle coconut flavor. It can easily be doubled or tripled. It is basically equal amounts by weight of egg, coconut, sugar, and butter with a touch of salt and powdered milk.

The cinnamon raisin filling is from Cook's Illustrated. I'm not sure I like the powdered sugar.  I much prefer my cinnabon filling but I think the powdered sugar works best for this split twist method.

This recipe is measured in volume rather than weight.  I find that it's not as crucial to have exact measurements. Even when weighing flour, the amount of liquid needed varies a tad. I usually make dough by the feel of the dough, starting with a slightly more wet dough and adding a little flour to get the right texture.

Milk Bread with Coconut Custard or Cinnamon Raising Filling

Tangzhong Water Roux:
1/3 cup bread flour
1 cup water (or replace with milk for richer bread)

Milk Bread Dough:
1/2 cup milk
half of tangzhong made from above
1 large egg, whisked
1 tablespoon milk powder
2 1/2 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons instant yeast
3 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces

Coconut Filling:
1 ounce egg (use half an egg and reserve the other half for egg wash)
1 ounce flaked coconut (either sweetened or unsweetened; adjust sugar if using unsweetened)
1 ounce sugar
1 ounce butter
pinch salt
1 teaspoon powdered milk
few drops of half & half or milk to make filling slightly moist

Cinnamon Raisin Filling:
3/4 cup raisins, soaked in water and drained
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons Saigon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon salt

Egg Wash:
Whisk reserved egg with half & half or milk.

Directions for Tangzhong:

Mix flour with liquid. Cook mixture over medium heat while stirring until mixture thickens.  Do not overcook tangzhong.  The tangzhong should come to a trace but still be slightly fluid.  Allow tangzhong to cool to room temperature before using. Only half of the tangzhong mixture is used for one recipe of milk bread but is difficult to properly cook smaller amounts. Make a double recipe of bread, using different fillings, or store tangzhong in refrigerator for up to three days.

Directions for Dough Using Bread Machine:

1. Add all milk bread dough ingredients except butter to bread machine. Select dough cycle on bread machine.  Once machine forms smooth dough, add in butter and allow machine to finish dough cycle. If dough looks too dry as it is kneading, add a little more liquid. If it is too wet, add a little more flour. Resist the urge to add too much flour.  The dough should be slightly wet and will continue to absorb more water.

2. Once dough cycle is complete, transfer dough to lightly floured surface and deflate dough.

To make one braided coconut custard loaf:
3. If making one braided loaf, shape dough into a rounded ball. Cover with moist flour sack towel and allow to rest for 15 to 20 minutes. Once dough has rested, roll dough into a 7x18 inch rectangle. Spread with filling, leaving a 1/4 inch border.  Starting from longer length of dough, roll dough like a cinnamon roll, seal seams by pinching close. Dough will shrink slightly in length after rolling.  Massage and stretch dough to 14 inches in length.  Cut the roll of dough in half lengthwise, turn halves with exposed filling facing up. Braid (twist) the two halves and place in 9 inch glass or light colored  aluminum loaf pan lined with parchments paper.Cover with moist flour sack towel and proof until doubled in size in a warm, draft-free spot. Brush with egg wash. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for approximately 15 minutes and then tent the top of loaf with aluminum foil and continue to bake another 25-30 minutes. Remove from pan immediately and cool on wire rack.  Allow loaf to cool before slicing.

To make braided cinnamon raisin buns:
3.  If making braided buns, divide dough into 8 equal pieces.  This can be done by first weighing the dough and dividing the weight by 8 and shaping into balls. Cover with moist flour sack towel and allow to rest for 15 to 20 minutes. Once dough has rested, roll out each portion into a 4x8 inch rectangle. Sprinkle dough with raisins and gently press raisins into dough using rolling pin or back of spoon. Sprinkle cinnamon sugar mixture over raisins. Roll each piece of dough, sealing seams by pinch. Cut each piece almost in half lengthwise, leaving about an inch of the dough attached. Twist the cut pieces together, keeping exposed filling side facing up. Create a round bun by bringing the two ends together, gently pressing and tucking ends under.  Place each bun on a baking sheet lined with silpat or parchment. Cover buns with moist flour sack towel and proof buns until doubled in size in a warm, draft-free spot. Brush with egg wash. Bake in preheated 350 degree oven for approximately 20-30 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

Tangzhong Water Roux Starter 

Ingredients 

I can't figure out how to rotate pictures. I'm not going to worry about it right now.

Dough cycle is complete and ready to be shaped.

I made a double batch to use up all of the tangzhong. Divide dough in half.

I then divided the dough into 8 equal pieces by weight.

Cover with moist flour sack towel.

Roll out dough into rectangle.

Spread coconut mixture.

Roll dough and seal seams by pinching.

Cut in half.

Turn the halves with exposed filling facing up.

Twist two halve together.

Arrange the twist in parchment lined baking pan.

Cover and proof in warm spot until doubled in size.

Bake until done.

I baked in a glass loaf pan since the dough is very rich and I didn't want it to brown too much.

Roll dough into smaller rectangles for Cinnamon Raisin Twisted Buns.

I used a half regular and half golden raisins.

Sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar mixture.

Roll

Split but leave about an inch attached.

Twist together and tuck ends underneath.

I baked 5 out of the 8 rolls separately.

3 of the buns were place in a parchment lined mini loaf pan.

Once doubled in size, brush with egg wash and bake.

They're not perfect.

The color is beautiful once baked.

Still can't figure out how to rotate these photos.

The mini cinnamon raisin loaf sliced up.

I tried using a bread slicing guide to help cut even slices.  It took too long so I tossed it aside.

I really tried doing the meal prepping thing but I have a problem with eating old food. I've come a long way with leftovers.  I can now eat leftovers the next day but I still cannot bring myself to cook on Sundays and prep meals for the entire week.

I cooked two small chicken breast in the toaster oven. It's enough for two meals. 

I cubed the chicken breast, tossed with melted coconut oil, and seasoned with a bbq rub I premixed in a container. It has both smoked Spanish and sweet Hungarian paprika.

I packed each container with steamed asparagus and a tricolor quinoa, kale, and butternut squash salad. I ate it cold because I don't like the smell of reheated chicken.

Most days, I boil two eggs in the morning and grab items from the fridge. I sometimes make yogurt on Sundays and divvy it up into glass containers. I add a spoonful of homemade jam, frozen fruit, or honey. If I'm feeling it, I'll top it with some Kashi Go Lean Crunch instead of granola. 

No fruit but I keep a container of dried plums in my drawer at work.

I prepped these in advance. Jalapeno havarti cheese, hardboiled eggs (I don't usually boil eggs the night before because I prefer them warm and freshly boiled), sliced pears, grapes, and Ozery Muesli Morning Rounds.

The dill havarti from Trader Joe's is delicious. I really like dill havarti and since they are hard to find, I pick up a package whenever I find them. There's currently 3 packages in the fridge. 

On this day it's butterfly shaped butter cracker. The day before were heart shaped lavosh crackers. The caramel dip was a bad idea.  It was too much sugar and I felt the crash before the end of the day.

I didn't eat all this. I burnt my crumpet in the morning and was out of Morning Rounds so I left early and stopped at the store. I bought a new package of morning rounds, some Madhava raw unfiltered honey, and a box of Justin's  honey peanut butter.  Sprouts does not sell it by the box so the cashier had to open the box and ring up each package. I remembered I had medjool dates in the cupboard and packed a few before leaving the house.

I wanted pasta for dinner one night. I couldn't sub all the spaghetti noodles with zucchini. I cooked up some bronze cut spaghetti al dente and then boiled the zucchini "noodles" for about a minute. We make out pasta with turkey because I don't like the taste of beef.

It's okay to have pasta twice in one week because I used half zucchini noodles. I made a quick alfredo sauce with heavy cream and butter. I baked the no knead bread dough too soon. I should have waited the full three days before baking because it was a little bland. I still have more dough in the fridge so I'll bake the rest tomorrow.

Donut Day at work. I met the donut guy outside my office. He delivers about 25 boxes of donuts to us every month. I only ate 2.

I opened up a box and this was stamp on the inside of the box.

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Lo Mai Gai or Nuo Mi Ji (Chicken and Glutinous Rice in Lotus Leaf)

I’m happy to announce that my cake phase is over…for now. I'm taking a break from baking cakes at least until I start my cake decorating classes in a few weeks. I've move on to the food in parcels phase.  To start off this phase, I made Lo Mai Gai or Nuo Mi Ji.  I think food wrapped in leaves deserve their own little category. 

I don’t usually get to eat Lo Mai Gai except for when we go out for dim sum. If I had to choose only one item to eat at dim sum, this is it. I can sit there and eat an entire parcel all by myself. I usually do not because I always feel bad about eating the entire thing.  That's why we always order two or three.

A few years ago, I went to dim sum with a bunch of girls. We then went to the Asian grocery store near the dim sum restaurant. My friend asked me if I could help her find all of the ingredients to make Lo Mai Gai at home. Asian food is complicated in the sense that most Westerners do not possess the necessary equipment or ingredients at home. This dish requires at least one if not two different types of steamers. I’ve been able to get away with just one steamer but it took some experimenting to successfully cook sticky rice without a sticky rice steamer.

I prefer a higher proportion of rice to meat so if you like more meat than rice, decrease the amount of rice to two cups and the broth to one cup. I prefer my rice to not be mushy so I use less broth than other recipes I've seen. You can also change the proportion of types of protein. I like using boneless chicken thighs without any char sui because I never really have Chinese barbecued pork around the house. I think the best part of the filling is the Chinese sausage so I use a little more than what is usually found inside your typical dim sum parcel. You can also add diced shrimp if you’re feeling it. I don’t like the smell of shiitake mushrooms so I rinse them really well and use a measly four mushrooms for the 8 packets. Use more if shitakes are your thing.  Asian food is very forgiving.  Adjust the proportions to your tastes. 

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Stir-Fried Rice Cakes (Chao Nian Gao)

The first time I had rice cake ovals (Nian Gao) was at Luong Hai Ky Restaurant on Convoy in San Diego. It is simply called pan-fried rice cake on the menu. My brother and his fiancée ordered it as our appetizer. I didn’t know what to expect but I ended up really liking the chewy texture of the cakes. I forgot about the cakes until the last time I went to Mr. Dumpling with them. They ordered it again. This time, the rice cake ovals were stir-fried like chow fun noodles. The char flavor from the hot wok and the sweetness of the cabbage and onions made the dish really tasty.

I bought a huge bag of the rice cakes from the Korean market. (Apparently, there isn’t much difference in the Chinese and the Korean versions.) I had a huge bag but I really didn’t know much about them. I did some reading online but there is very little information on these tasty little morsels of goodness. To further confuse things, they are called Nian Gao, the same name for other types of sweet and savory rice cakes. Most of the blogs I found simply had pictures of Chao Nian Gao ordered at a restaurant. I couldn’t find a recipe for the version I had at Mr. Dumpling so I looked at the picture I took and attempted to recreate it. How difficult could it be? Isn't it basically chow fun?

I think it was a success. The bf took a few bites, looked at me and asked, "how much of these noodles do we have left?" He wanted to make sure we had more rice cakes for another meal. I assured him that I only used 4 cups and we still had quite a bit left.

Stir-Fried Rice Cakes (Chao Nian Gao)

4 cups rice cakes (rice ovals or ovalettes)
2 tablespoons canola oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 pound chicken breast, thinly sliced (or pork or beef)
½ onion, sliced
½ head green cabbage , shredded
1 carrot, shredded
2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
1 tablespoon Shao Xing wine
1 tablespoon sugar
MSG, to taste
Salt , to taste
Pepper, to taste
Green onions
1 pound shrimp, peeled and deveined (or other seafood)

1. Prep rice cake according to package directions. (It may take some advance planning if using dried rice cakes.) I’m using semi-dried refrigerated rice cakes. The directions on the package is for soup so I just went ahead and boiled them for about a minute, drained and set aside.

2. Prep the rest of the ingredients. This goes really quickly so mise en place is everything.

3. Heat a large wok or stir-fry pan on high heat and add oil. When oil is hot, add garlic and onions. Sauté a few minutes.

4. Add chicken breast and sauté until cooked through. Add cabbage and carrots. Cook until moisture has evaporated. Add soy sauce, oyster sauce, wine, sugar, MSG, salt and pepper. Toss everything together and taste. Adjust seasoning.

5. Add boiled rice cakes, green onions and shrimp. Toss to coat. Cook a few minutes until heated through. If the pan gets too dry, add a little water or chicken broth.

Feel free to use less meat and seafood. My version is protein-heavy since the bf likes a lot of chicken and shrimp.

I love it when I take pictures of food and capture the steam from the food. Someone once asked how to take pictures of steaming food and not fog up the camera's lens. The answer is simple: stand back and zoom in.

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