Bread (Sweet Buns)

The price of bread and baking ingredients have increased. I have not been buying bread from shops ever since I attended a basic bread baking course. I bought a numbers of books on baking bread. Once you know the basic methods of bread making , just refer to the recipe books and you can make wonderful home baked bread. My favorite is sweet bun because with this sweet bun dough you can make many types of buns with fillings such as sausage bun, cocktail bun, cream horns, cheese stick, meat floss bun, peanut, tuna, sardine, curry chicken, red bean, and the list can be endless. I even baked multi grains buns for my camping trip to Gunung Chamah.

My daughter is having her SPM examinations starting tomorrow and I have started preparing a few type buns since last week. She told me she would prefer to have bread rather than the food sold in the school canteen or food court nearby. I have prepared some plain buns that can be topped with cheese or garlic or mixed herbs, mixed fruit plait bread and sausage pizza bread. I store the ready shaped buns in the freezer and take them out to prove before baking, normally it will take a least 2 - 3 hours for proving.

There are 3 methods of making basic sweet bun dough. First method is 'no time dough' method which does not need to go through basic proving. Second method is 'straight dough' method which needs one basic proving for about 45 - 60 minutes. The third method which I have learned is 'sponge and dough' method. This method needs longer preparation time. First of all a sponge dough is prepared which needs to prove for 4 - 5 hours or even longer. After a second mixing, it has a 10 minutes rest. Then divided, mold it round, then fill it with filling and shaped. This method produces a softer, bigger buns which last longer.

Sponge Dough

630g High Protein Flour
7g Instant Yeast
383g Water

Mix the high protein flour, instant yeast and water to form dough. Keep them in a big container with cover for proving at least 4 - 5 hours.


Main Dough

270g High protein Flour
38g Milk Powder
14g Salt
180g Sugar
18g Instant Yeast
45g Water
113g Eggs
135g Butter

When the sponge dough is ready, prepare the main dough by mixing all the dry ingredient with water and eggs. Add the sponge dough to the main dough. Lastly, add the butter and knead to form a smooth and elastic dough. Divide the well proved dough into 55g each and there will be 33 pieces. Shape them into balls and allow to rest for 10 - 15 minutes. For shaping and filling , just flatten the dough and put in the filling or make bread into the required shape. When the bread has been throughly proved and is ready for baking, brush the top with egg wash. Preheat the oven at 190°C before baking. Baking time is less than 10 minutes or till the buns become golden brown. When is ready glaze them with butter.


Last but not least, try them out and practice a lot.
Have fun and be happy! ♥