Coconut cocktail buns (and Tangzhong Starter)

So I mentioned in my last post that we visited Chinatown in SF the other day and bought a lot of delicious edibles. One of them included a giant pink box (mm always a good sign) of Cantonese bakery items. Most of it consisted of my dad's favorite, Coconut cocktail buns or GaiMeiBao.

I actually tried making them last week but didn't post because I didn't get a good picture of it. I tried making them again today using Angie's recipe but ran into a few complications. For one thing, my buns did not rise as much as I would have liked...maybe my yeast was too old? And for another, my topping melted off and pooled around the buns during the baking process. Now that I understand; I didn't have shortening (ugh, scary stuff) so I substituted with extra butter. Butter unfortunately has a higher water content (thus the lower calories), which means that it melts much more easily and becomes much more runny in heat.

Oh well. It still didn't come out too bad.


Coconut Cocktail Bun

Ingredients:

A.
285 g bread flour (plus more for kneading)
42 g sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp instant dried yeast

B.
1/2 egg
85 ml milk
84 g tangzhong starter

C.
22 g butter

Filling

60 g butter
20 g sugar
10 g cornstarch
1.5 tbsp sugar
20 g coconut (or more, to your taste)

Topping

30 g shortening
20 g butter
40 g confectioner's sugar
40 g cake flour
1/2 egg
1/4 tsp salt

1. Combine A and B and mix until a dough forms. Add butter gradually and knead for about 6-7 minutes, until the dough is smooth and elastic. You may have to add more flour as you knead.
2. Leave covered in a warm place and allow to rise 1 hour until the dough has doubled in size.
3. Meanwhile, make the filling. Beat the butter and 1.5 tbsp sugar until smooth. Add the remaining sugar, cornstarch, and coconut to the mixture.
4. For the topping, first beat the shortening, butter, and sugar until smooth. Gradually add in egg and salt and mix, before adding the flour as well. Mix well.
5. After the ferment, take out the dough and divide into 6 even pieces. Flatten each piece and slather 1/3 of the filling over it. Top with extra coconut. Then pinch the ends together and close the filling up. Repeat for the other 5.
6. Cover with saran wrap and allow to rest another 30 minutes.
7. Brush each bun with egg wash (a beaten egg yolk), then pipe topping over it. Top with sesame seeds.
8. Bake at 350F until golden brown.