65°C Bread

Mention the word bread and you'll hear groans from my family and probably neighbours who have been tormented by the daily aroma of baking bread, sometimes at ungodly hours when my mood takes me. Yes, I'm obsessed with bread making. Like many others, I've just joined the bread bandwagon and have been scouring the internet for bread recipes. Somebody has been busy!

Just when I thought my dinner rolls were about as soft as they can get, I stumbled upon yet another breadmaking technique called the 65 degrees bread or tangzhong method, using a water roux bread starter. This is clearly the bread winner!

So what is tangzhong?  Apparently, tangzhong is an ancient Chinese (some say Japanese) technique of using hot water to cook flour into a starchy paste used in the making of steamed dumplings (bao), buns, etc . I have not been able to find a satisfactory explanation on how tangzhong really works - it has something to do with the gelatinization of starch at 65°C resulting in a high moisture content which thus, yields bread that stays super soft and moist even after several days.

Here's a video by DessertzHouse to walk you through the steps of making tangzhong


And with the tangzhong starter, you can start rolling.