Honey Cinnamon Swirl Milk Bread
Milk bread is one of my all time favorite bread! It’s so soft, light and perfect for breakfast toast. Elevating this with honey and cinnamon swirl add more flavor, texture and makes it visually more appealing! Perfect way to ease into the Fall season.
Ingredients:
For Tangzhong:
15g bread flour
75g water
For the dough:
260g bread flour
1/2 tsp salt
20g honey
1 tsp instant yeast
1 egg
25g milk
45g heavy whipping cream
All of the tangzhong, cooled to room temperature
30g unsalted butter, softened
For the cinnamon swirl:
2 tsp cinnamon powder
1/8 cup turbinado sugar
Steps:
1. To make the tangzhong, mix the water and flour in a pot. Over a medium heat, cook the mixture until it forms a thick paste (make sure to keep stirring while cooking). Set aside and let it cool to room temperature.
2. In a mixing bowl with a dough hook attachment, add in all of the dough ingredients except the butter. At the lowest speed, mix the ingredients until they roughly come together to form a dough. Increase the speed to medium level and continue kneading for about 10 minutes until the dough starts to look smooth.
3. Add in the softened butter and continue kneading for another 10 minutes, until it passes the window pane test*.
4. Shape the dough into a round ball and place it in a bowl covered and let it proof at a slightly warm area (about 78F) until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
5. Once proofed, punch the doughs to release the air. Shape it to a ball, cover and let it rest for about 15 minutes.
6. Grease the pullman loaf pan with butter. Make sure every corner of the pan is well greased. In a small bowl, mix in the turbinado sugar and cinnamon powder.
7. Roll the dough out to 6.5inch wide (or to fit the width of the loaf pan) and about 14inch long.
8. Sprinkle the cinnamon mixture on to the dough, leaving about 1/2 inch gap in each corner unfilled. Roll up the dough from the short edge and pinch the seam to seal. Place the rolled dough into the loaf pan. Cover it and let it proof again until doubled in size or until the dough reaches close to the top of the pan. If using the pullman loaf pan with lid on, make sure you can cover the pan with the lid once the dough is well proofed.
9: Preheat the oven to 395F. If baking with lid on, bake the bread for about 35-38 minutes. If baking with lid off, bake the bread for about 25-28 minutes or until golden brown. If baking with lid off, cover the top of the bread with aluminum foil half way through baking to prevent over browning.
10. Once baked, remove the bread from the pan immediately and let it cool on a cooling rack for about 10-15 minutes before slicing. It's easier to slice the bread when it's at room temperature.
11. You should see the cinnamon swirl on your first slice. Time to enjoy some freshly baked bread!
* Window pane test is very crucial in bread baking process because it helps determine whether the dough has built up enough gluten. To do this test, take a small piece of dough, stretch the dough out as wide as possible - if it doesn't break and able to create a very thin, almost transparent film, that's when it passes the window pane test.