周老師的美食教室英文版

Milk-flavored white bread (toast) is a type of sweetened white bread. It is made with sugar and a greater amount of butter than the traditional loaf. It tastes more flavorful because milk is used instead of water.

You may also add eggs if you wish but I didn’t use it for those who cannot eat eggs. Besides this recipe, the soft French style bread dough (http://blog.yam.com/homeeconomics/article/10003136) is also suitable for making the sweetened white bread. It has a lower water content but with a great aroma and a more chewy texture.

Ingredients Yield: 900 g (2 lb), 1 loaf

Cold milk – 360 g

Instant yeast – 2 teaspoons

Bread flour – 550 g

White sugar – 55 g

Salt – 1¼ teaspoons

Butter – 55 g, cut into small pieces

2lb Pullman loaf pan with lid – 1

Steps

1. Except butter, add all other ingredients in the order listed into the mixing bowl of the stand mixer with a dough hook. Mix with low speed first then switch to higher speed when the ingredients are combined and won’t fling out of the bowl.
2.   Once the ingredients pull together into dough, add the small pieces of butter. Mix on medium speed (please refer to stand mixer’s manual for the appropriate speed) for 10 – 15 minutes until it can be easily stretched out to a very thin membrane before it ruptures (see note 1). The temperature of the finished dough should be between 26 ~ 28°C (78.8 ~ 82.4°F).      
3. Place the dough in a warm humid place (28°C or 82.4°F, relative humidity 75%) to rise for 1 hour and 30 minutes.
4. Cut the dough into 5 equal portions. Each portion is about 200 g. Round out each portion and let it relax for 5 minutes.
5. Roll out and flatten each portion then fold it 3 times into a rectangle. Let it relax for another 5 minutes.
6. Roll each dough out into a long oval then roll it back up into a log.
7. Put all 5 logs into the buttered loaf pan.
8. Put the loaf pan in a warm humid place (38°C or 100.4°F, relative humidity 75%) for the last rise. The fermented dough should fill about 90% of the pan. It will take about 1 hour to 1 hour and 30 minutes.
9. Preheat the oven to 200°C (392°F). Put the lid on the loaf pan and bake the loaf on the bottom rack for 45 minutes. See note 2.  
10. Once the loaf has finished baking, remove the lid, turn the loaf out, and let it cool on the rack. Cooling on the rack will make sure the loaf will not sack in the middle. Only slice the loaf into slices when it is completely cooled, or slice the loaf in half then bag them.

Note 1:

the quality of the flour dictates how well the bread will turn out. If the flour doesn’t contain enough gluten or it is low quality, the dough will not be able to stretch to the thin membrane stage. The whole bowl of dough is basically a sticky mass. This dough will never produce a successful loaf of bread.

Note 2:

since each oven is different, please adjust the baking temperature accordingly. If this is your first time making bread with Pullman loaf pan with lid, you should pay extra attention during baking. With the lid on, you won’t be able to judge the baking stage based on the loaf’s color. If you smell the aroma of the baked bread half way through baking, the temperature is too high. Do not remove the loaf from the oven but continuing to bake with lower temperature. If the bread is taken out of the oven too early, the center of the loaf may still be raw. When the baking time is done, open the lid and check on the color. If the color is too light, bake the loaf a while longer until it picks up the golden color.

If you are not using the lid to bake the bread, you need 10% more of each ingredient. The dough should fill to the top of the loaf pan after the last rise. The bread will rise up and form 5 beautiful hills while baking. The baking temperature needs to be lowered to 175°C (347°F) and decrease baking time to 40 minutes because the bread burns more easily without the lid on. Cover the top of the bread with a piece of foil if it has already obtained the golden color but it is not quite done. If you have separate upper and lower coil controls, turn off the upper coil to prevent the top of the bread from becoming too dark.

The quality of the loaf pans nowadays is quite good. The bread can turn out of the pan even without buttering. The pressure release hole at the bottom of the pan further ensures that the loaf won’t be stuck in the pan. The hole is not used to release steam because it is too small and it is covered by the dough. The steam doesn’t get a chance to form on the bottom of the pan because the loaf must be turned out immediately once it is out of the oven.

Please refer to recipes #127 and #128 (Sweet Taiwanese Style Bread) for other important notes about making bread.

(This is whole wheat bread)