Sunday, October 11, 2015

Chinese Steamed Buns - Mantou (饅頭)


I LOVE LOVE LOVE the soft inside fluffy parts of bread.  Crust can be ok, but by and far it is always the fluffy insides that I love to sink my teeth into when eating a piece of a bread.  Chinese steamed buns, or mantou (饅頭) are like the fluffy insides of a fresh baked loaf of bread, without any of the hard or dry crusts that comes with regular bread.  Unfortunately, most of the mantou you can buy at the grocery stores here in the U.S. are always too dense or dry for my liking, and I missed the ones my mom used to make which were chewier and fluffier, with a bounce.

 


Asking my mom for a recipe though usually amounts to "just add a little of this, and some of that and mix until it looks/feels about right." So... I turned to Google Search and browsed a bunch of sites, read some comments, and chose to Frankenstein together several of the ideas.  I specifically wanted to try and make black sesame and sweet potato versions.  It took a few batches, but I'm pretty happy with how it finally came out for the sweet potato and plain versions.  The black sesame ones, alas, will still need some work (didn't help that I overcooked them and they kinda burned too - I REALLY want to make a Totoro version!!!). (。-_-。)

My poor deformed and burned Totoros
Feel free to play with the ratios of flours.  If you like a denser feel, you can try replacing some of the AP flour with bread flour (50% AP, 25% BF, 25% CF for example).  Most recipes call for adding a bit of lard or canola oil - I chose to use butter instead, but you can replace with equivalent amount of lard/shortening or 1TB of oil.

I need to start my baking earlier for better lighting... (^^ゞ


Makes 6-8 buns for each version

Special Equipment
- Steamer
- Parchment paper

Ingredients
Plain Mantou Version
- 100g milk (I used whole but you can use any kind or even just water)
- 130g all purpose flour
- 70g cake flour
- 25-50g sugar (I used 45g)
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp active dry yeast
- pinch of salt
- 20g unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into small pieces

Sweet Potato Version
- 1 tsp active dry yeast
- 100g milk (I used whole but you can use any kind or even just water)
- 100g steamed and mashed sweet potato/yam (any kind - I used garnet yam and Stokes purple sweet potato for these, but would recommend you try the smaller Okinawan purple sweet potatoes if you can find them!)
- 130g all purpose flour
- 70g cake flour
- 25-50g sugar (I used 40g)
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 20g unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into small pieces

Warm the milk to between 105° to 110°F.  Combine milk and yeast in a small bowl and let it proof for about 5 minutes.

Whisk the remaining ingredients except the butter, together in a medium bowl.  If you are using sweet potatoes, add them in now and use your fingers or a pastry cutter to thoroughly mix the dry ingredients and sweet potato mash together.  Make a well in the center and add the milk and yeast mixture; combine to make a rough dough.

Turn out dough on a lightly floured surface and knead in the butter until smooth and elastic - about 5 to 10 minutes.  The dough should still be tacky but not stick to your fingers.  Try to avoid adding extra flour - usually just kneading it well enough should do the trick.  Make a ball,  and let it rise covered with a damp cloth in a warm spot for 1 hour, until doubled in volume.

Shape the dough however you like, and place them on pieces of parchment paper.  The traditional shape is to roll the dough out in a flat rectangle, and then roll up the dough like you are rolling up a piece of paper into a tube.  Cut about 2" slices across the cylinder of dough and place each slice on a small piece of parchment paper.

Let it rest and rise for another 15 to 30 minutes.  Steam for 10-15 minutes on medium high heat depending on the size of your buns (I typically only need 10-12 minutes).  After it finishes steaming, let it sit covered for 5 minutes before removing the lid.  Buns should be eaten immediately or can be frozen and reheated later (preferably via steaming).

Tip: If you are using a metal steamer instead of bamboo, use a clean towel between the steamer and the lid to prevent condensation from dripping down and wrinkling the buns



Shape Ideas:

Roses - Measure out 5-6 small balls of dough, weighing about 15g each.  Roll out each ball into roughly 3" diameter and layer them together, stacking them so that each layer half covers the layer before it.  Roll it up, and then use a sharp knife or pastry scraper to cut it in half, giving you two roses.  I forgot to take pictures myself of the steps, but you can see a guide here.

Multi-colored buns - Roll out two rectangles of dough in each color (thinner than you would normally roll it for one color only), brush one layer with a bit of water or oil, place the other layer on top, and roll up the dough like a tube and slice like normal - link here.

Hua Juan - Measure out a 50g ball of dough and roll it in a long oval shape.  Leaving about a half inch at the top of the oval, cut vertical strips into the dough like you are making octopus legs.  Lift up the entire piece and twist the dough strands as if you twisting rope, and tuck the ends under.  You can check out a video here showing how.


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