Pandan Shokupan (Japanese Bread)
Some day a while back I went for dinner with a bunch of colleagues to this place that served really good shokupan. I mean, it's really good but also bloody expensive for bread. After that meal, I had a sudden urge to start making yeasted bread so I got a bread tin the very next day. My first loaf was a pandan swirl Shokupan bread loaf - there was barely any taste of pandan, but I loved the green!
This recipe is made with yudane - Yudane is made by combining flour with boiling water to cook the flour, causing starches in the flour to gelatinize and hold more moisture. The result? Softer and fluffier bread!
Soft, fluffy pandan swirl yeasted bread made with yudane.
Recipe adapted from whattocooktoday.
- 60 g bread flour
- 60 g boiling water
- 255 g bread flour
- 5 g instant yeast
- 15 g milk powder
- 30 g sugar
- 4 g salt
- 150 g milk
- 30 g butter (unsalted butter)
- 1 tsp pandan extract
- 1 egg
- 1 tbsp milk
Boil water, add to 60g bread flour. Mix to combine until a sticky dough forms. Cover and store at room temperature for 4h or overnight in the fridge.
Attach the dough hook onto your stand mixer. In stand mixing bowl, add bread flour, instant yeast, milk powder, sugar, salt, milk and yudane. Start mixing on low. Increase mixing speed (speed 2 on Kitchenaid) and mix for 5 minutes.
Add room temperature butter, small additions at a time. Increase speed of mixer (speed 4 on Kitchenaid), mix for 8-10 minutes until dough is smooth and elastic.
Do a windowpane test to test if dough is ready. If not, continue mixing a while longer.Split dough into two, return half the dough back to the stand mixer and add pandan extract. Mix until just combined (do not over mix).
Lightly oil two bowls. Place plain dough and pandan dough in separate bowls, leaving them covered to rise for 1-2 hours (it takes about 1.5 hours around 27C room temperature).
Once dough has risen and almost doubled in size, lightly punch dough down.
Oil bread tin.
- Shape Bread
Starting with the plain dough, roll out until it's a rectangle (size does not really matter - the long side should be facing you). Roll out the pandan dough until a similar size, and place on top of the plain dough.
Like folding a brochure, fold the left to meet the middle, and fold the right over the left.
Rotate the dough 90 degrees. Using a rolling pin, roll the dough out.
Continue rolling until the short end of the dough is approximately the length of your bread tin.
Roll the dough like a swiss roll.
Place it seam-side down in the oiled bread tin, cover and let sit and proof for another 45 minutes.
(The scoring on the bread is optional)
Preheat oven to 180C.
Once bread is proofed (should further grow in size, when you gently poke the dough, the indent bounces back gradually), egg wash over surface of bread. Bake in pre-heated oven for 40 minutes until top is golden brown.
Let cool completely before slicing.
Slice and store in freezer if not consuming within 2 days.