Super Soft Bread Loaf with Walnuts & White Sesame Seeds

I'm glad that I made this loaf of bread the day before I moved out of my old apartment. I spent literally most of my waking hours packing and organizing stuff--I simply didn't have time to cook at all! So, I pretty much survived on the bread that day by using it in sandwiches and eating it plain because it was SO good!

This recipe for this bread was shared by MH and I've used it three times. The first two didn't turn out right because the middle section of the loaves was undercooked! Nonetheless, the cooked part was really soft and not dry. I felt really awful about that. This is by no means saying that the recipe isn't good. I guess it's hard for my 30x10.5x11cm Pullman loaf tin to get the bread dough fully cooked without having the end product becoming a little too dry! Why?

For my latest attempt, I baked the bread for about 55 minutes rather than 30 minutes as suggested in the recipe. So, I reckoned that 55 minutes should be okay as the middle section of the bread still turned out undercooked after 45 minutes of baking for my second attempt. Yes, it was fully cooked this time but a tad too dry I think. And, this made me feel really unhappy and frustrated. I guess I'll have to experiment with my Pullman loaf tin more.

Also for this latest attempt, I reduced the sugar by 20g because the two previous loaves were a bit too sweet for me. I suppose you can even reduce it by 30~40g, which I may try when I'm making bread using this recipe again. I've tried it with both white and brown sugar, and the loaves turned out just fine.

Besides making plain sandwich loaves, you can also throw in whatever you like into your bread. This is the nice thing about homemade bread--be as creative as you want and tailor-make the bread to suit your own taste! Getting slightly tired of plain sandwich loaves, I decided to roll in some chopped roasted walnuts and coat the loaf with white sesame seeds. It turned out perfectly sweet--like how a good sandwich loaf should be--and nutty! Yummy! So, without further ado, here's the recipe:


Super Soft Milk Loaf (adapted from My Home Kitchen's)
For one 30x10.5x11cm Pullman loaf tin

(A)
850g bread flour
108g sugar
12g salt (I increased it because I used unsalted butter)
13g milk powder

(B)
196g heavy cream
184g egg whites

(C)
9g active dry yeast
196g warm water, at 43C/110F 85g

unsalted butter, at room temperature

some coarsely chopped roasted walnuts
some white sesame seeds, for coating

1 egg, slightly beaten and set aside for egg wash

1. Dissolve together (C) and let it sit till frothy
2. Combine together (A) and make a well in the center, then stir in (B) and yeast mixture; mix them together till a dough forms and pulls away from the sides of the mixing bowl
3. Turn the dough out onto a working surface and knead till gluten develops, then knead in the butter till it's incorporated; continue kneading the dough till it reaches the window pane stage and is smooth and elastic
4. Round the dough up and place it into an oiled large mixing bowl, cover and let it proof till doubled
5. Deflate and divide the dough into 4 equal portions, then round them up and cover to let rest for 10 minutes
6. Roll each portion of the dough out into a rectangle and roll it up from its shorter end Swiss roll style, pinch the end up tightly to seal it up and cover to let rest for 10 minutes
7. Roll each portion of the dough out into a rectangle again and sprinkle some chopped walnuts it, then roll it up from its shorter end Swiss roll style and pinch the end up tightly to seal it up.
   Brush some egg wash all over each rolled-up portion of dough, then roll in some white sesame seeds all over it; place them in a greased 30x10.5x11cm Pullman loaf tin, leaving some room in between each of them for expansion; cover the tin to proof till the dough is almost doubled
8. Bake at 180C/350F for 50-55 minutes or till it's cooked thoroughly and looks golden brown on its top; remove it from the oven and immediately unmold the bread loaf to cool it thoroughly before slicing to serve and storing