Tuesday, July 22, 2008

STUFFED BUNS

Even though its a Tuesday and I should be posting my week's menu, I feel its much more exciting to post my "bun-ny" experience..
I wanted to post this recipe earlier but somehow that was not happening, so I thought why not postpone the menu for a day.
OK so talking about my bun-ny experience, well I did search for a lot of burger bun recipes and came across tons of them. One in particular looked simple, and I did not have to go through the trouble of making any conversions or changes in ingredient quantities. With just the addition of an egg, I went on to follow the recipe (that I found online) and voila........there they were fluffy, round and soft burger buns.
Now comes the question of, why stuffed? Well I wanted to send these in for Breadbaking day event hosted by Aparna of My diverse kitchen. I thought why not try stuffed buns instead of regular buns. Back in college in Kolkatta, there was this bread shop called hot breads, they served delicious stuffed masala buns, so that was it, I got into my apron and kneaded up some dough.
Here is the recipe
You will need
for the bun
  • warm water- 1 cup
  • sugar- 1 tsp
  • dry yeast- 1 tbsp
  • warm milk- 3/4th cup
  • butter- 1/4th cup
  • salt- 1,1/2 tsp
  • flour- 3 1/2 cups, (1 cup additional for the rolling out process).
  • egg- 1 whole
  • egg white- 1
  • red chilli flakes- 1/2 tsp
  • sesame seeds- 1 tbsp
  • olive oil- a little
for the filling
  • ricotta cheese- 1/2 cup
  • thawed and boiled spinach- 1 cup
  • crushed garlic- 1-2 pods
  • salt and pepper to taste.


You have to

for the filling
  1. In a bowl,mix the ricotta cheese along with the spinach. add the crushed garlic along with the seasoning. You can add other seasonings too.
  2. combine everything together, check for salt. keep it aside.
for the buns
  1. proof the yeast in 1 cup of water with sugar. let it foam for around 10 mins.
  2. knead together the flour, butter, red chili flakes milk and salt and egg.
  3. add the foamed yeast to the flour mixture and begin to knead.
  4. here the dough gets sticky.
  5. let it stand for around 10 more mins.
  6. knead the dough. here you might need some dry flour,use it. knead the dough till smooth and elastic.
  7. grease a big bowl, and place dough in it, covered.
  8. leave it to rise for at least an hour to hour an a half.
  9. punch the dough down.
  10. take it out on a floured surface.
  11. knead the dough. shape them into balls.
  12. to add filling, roll some dough into a ball, make a depression in the center of the ball, and add the filling in the middle. pinch the dough back to seal it.
  13. roll again into a round.
  14. cover and let it stand for another 30- 40 mins.
  15. preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
  16. brush with an egg wash (egg white and water mixture). sprinkle sesame seeds.
  17. bake for 20 mins, or till nice and brown.
some points to note.
  1. while taking the dough out of the bowl onto the floured board, make sure you dip your fingers in oil. this way the dough won't stick.
  2. while shaping the dough, it is important to keep adding some dry flour, so that shaping becomes easier.
  3. keeping the dough soft and sticky will help in producing soft buns.

enjoy



14 comments:

notyet100 said...

wow...wish i could bake too...thy look yum,.nd ya just saw thnks for addin me in ur blogroll..hppy bloggin

Medhaa said...

Love the spinach stuffing. The buns look lovely.

Unknown said...

love the filling..

Uma said...

yummy buns Karuna! lOve the addition of spinach.

Anonymous said...

The buns look fresh. I can smell it here. So good with the stuffing in it.

Aparna Balasubramanian said...

Nice way to pep up plain buns.
I started my baking adventures with my friend's recipe for stuffed masala buns!
Thanks for participating.

notyet100 said...

nd ya,.i saw the post of pindi chola enjoyed readin it,..

Usha said...

Wow,that looks delicious,an awesome effort,good job :)

Unknown said...

wow... fantastic entry... great click... looks yummy

Indian Khana said...

First thing first...love your header..eye catching...nice work done.
Bun looks too gud..

karuna said...

thanks a lot priti.

renuka said...

A perfect bun,will try very soon and an excellent blog

Anonymous said...

Nice entry. Filled buns are always fun to eat.

Radhika said...

Hi Karuna,

Yesterday evening i tried your recipe with little modification. Instead of 3 1/2 cup of flour i added 4 cups white and 1 cup wheat flour. And I did chicken stuffing. It was excellent. Everybody at home loved it. I was impressed on the picture and did it for the first time. Also I used the stand mixer.Thankyou for the recipe.Its a real big hit and definitely it's fantastic picnic dish and also its great for the lunch boxes for the kids. I am going to try with a variety of other stuffing and also i am going to try with different kinds of flour will let you know how it comes....