Ingredients

450g plain flour
8g yeast
80g sugar
1 tsp salt
200ml room temperature water
70g room temperature butter cut into 7 pieces
Sausage cut into pieces or cocktail sausages
1 egg plus 1 tbsp water mixed

Method

1 . Add the flour, yeast, sugar, salt and water into the mixing bowl with a dough hook and mix it for about 15 minutes, making sure you scrap the side. (Remember to add the yeast on the opposite side of the salt as direct contact might kill the yeast)

2 . Next, add in the butter one piece at a time, allowing it to be incorporating into the dough before adding the next piece. 

3 . After all the butter has been added, carry on mixing for about 5-10 minutes.

4 . Set it aside and let to rise for 1-2 hours, doubling in size.

5 . Hand-knead the dough on a floured surface for about 1-2 minutes and portion out into 8 or 16 equal pieces, depending on how big you want your buns.

6 . Next, wrap your dough around the sausage pieces and allow to rise for 1 hour on a baking tray, evenly spaced out.

7 . Brush the top of the the buns with the egg wash and bake at 200 degrees celsius on the middle rack for about 13 minutes.

What’s on my mind…

Ever since I was young, I have loved these traditional soft buns and when I learnt how to make them, I realised the amount of time and effort that goes into them. My mum always says, its more worth it to buy from the bakeries, but well, I like the challenge.

For those who do not have a blender, you can actually hand mix in a bowl and use a clean greased surface to knead in the butter as well, but it will take you double or even triple the amount of time taken using a blender. Personally, I find it really therapeutic to knead by hand but it does get tiring.

Lastly, you can fill these buns up with pretty much anything, but do remember to make sure the you add in something that has a little moisture content of its own. For example, when I used dried cranberries, the buns were rock hard because the dried cranberries absorbed the moisture from the dough. So the solution would be to soak the cranberries in a little water (or champagne) and plump them up before putting them in the dough. Just make sure it is not dripping wet when you stuff the dough. 

Ingredients

For the dough:

1/2 cup water
1 and a 1/2 teaspoons of yeast
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons unsalted butter (melted, cooled)
1 and a 1/2 cups of plain flour, plus extra for rolling

For the filling:

1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

Instructions

1. Place all the ingredients meant for the dough into the mixing bowl with the dough hook attachment and mix until you get a smooth dough which is about 5 to 10 minutes of mixing. (Make sure to add the salt at the opposite side of the yeast and also make sure the melted butter is completely cool. This is to ensure the yeast is not killed by the salt or heat.)

2. Place the dough in a greased bowl and let it rise for an hour.

3. In a small bowl, combine the walnuts, brown sugar and salt. (Do not skip the salt as the buns will taste bland without it.) Add some of the walnut mixture to the bottom of an 8 inch cake pan and spread 2 tablespoons worth of thin butter slices over the walnut filling in the pan.

4. Roll out the dough to form a rectangle and spread the remaining 4 tablespoons of butter over the dough evenly and sprinkle the rest of the walnut mixture over the dough. Roll the dough up into a tight log, and slice into 4 to 6 equal pieces. Place the buns into the pan together and it doesn’t matter if they touch each other. Allow to rise for 30 minutes.

5. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius and bake for 20 minutes.

6. Let the buns cool in the pan for a few minutes before turning the pan upside down and serve immediately.

What’s on my mind…

This recipe was first found from a website called dessertfortwo.com but I adapted it to use a cake pan instead of muffin pan and with walnuts because it was easier to get in Singapore. Of course, you may substitute any nuts of your liking for this recipe. I love to serve this hot because the sugar would be scorching and the smell of caramelised sugar is just to die for.

Ingredients

120g of butter at room temp
50g caster sugar
100g brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence
170g plain flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
170g chocolate chips
55g chopped walnuts

Method

1 . Preheat your oven to 180 degrees celsius.

2 . Using an electric mixer, mix the butter and both sugars until they are well blended. Not too long, about 3 to 5 minutes.

3 . In a separate bowl, use a fork to mix the egg and vanilla essence. Then add this into the butter and sugar mixture. Blend until it is well mixed.

4 . Sieve the flour, bicarbonate soda and salt. Then add into the mixing bowl and blend until well mixed.

5 . Lastly, add in the chocolate chips and walnuts and mix with a spatula.

6 . Place small dollops of cookie dough on a baking tray according to the size you want. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until it is golden brown.

What’s on my mind…

The moment you remove the cookies from the oven, it would feel soft. It will harden as it cools down but after cooling down, if you find that it is not crispy or crunchy enough, go ahead and re-bake these cookies for another 5 to 10 minutes to crisp them up.

If you find that your cookies are too flat, it simply means the butter is too “melted” or soft before baking. One way to get a nice cookie that isn’t flat is to place the unbaked dollops of cookie dough in the fridge or freezer for a few minutes before baking. This will allow the cookie to maintain its shape by the end of the baking process in the oven.

I personally like to use Buttercup Margarine for this recipe because it somehow works better and it is really cheap. You can definitely use any sort of butter or margarine you prefer.