How to Make Buns: Methods & Recipe

Made with flour, butter,sugar, eggs, and yeast, buns are small rolls that have a richer and sweetertaste than plain bread; let’s discuss how to make buns.

A bun is also called a bread roll, like a burger bun. It can be flavoured or filled with some other ingredients depending on style, including spices and dried fruits. There are various types of buns, such as Nigerian buns, Bath buns, Chelsea buns, sweet bread buns, currant buns (like hot cross buns, saffron buns, London buns, and Colston buns.

In this post, we willonly focus on how to make Nigerian buns and sweet bread buns.

Steps to Make Nigerian Buns: Ingredientsand Instructions

Nigerian buns are harder and less oily in comparison with the Nigerian Puff Puff. Some buns of this type are so hard, which is why they’re called rock buns. To make Nigerian buns, you will need plain flour (which is also referred to as all-purpose flour), evaporated milk or powdered milk, baking powder, salt, granulated sugar, warm water, nutmeg, and vegetable oil.

More specifically, the following ingredientswill be enough to make 7 buns balls:

• 150 grams (or 5.3 oz) of plain flour
• 2 tablespoons (tbsp.) of evaporated milk (such as PeakMilk) or 1 tbsp. of powdered milk
• ½ teaspoon of baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon of salt
• 1 tbsp. of granulated sugar
• ¼ teaspoon of nutmeg (to create the authentic taste)
• Vegetable Oil (this will be used for frying)
• Warm water (this ingredient will be used for mixing)

Here are the instructions to make buns with these ingredients: 

• Put the necessary amount of oil in a deep pan or pot and heatup the oil just before you begin the preparation for the batter.
• Sift the flour, baking powder, sugar & salt together ina bowl.
• Then, pour in around ¼th cup of water at a time and mixlightly each time till you can see the consistency of the batter is similar tothick muffin batter. You could need more or less than 1 or 1 ½ cups of waterdepending on the flour. You have to be careful so you don’t over-mix since thiscould make your buns hard.
• The oil temperature should be around 350–355ºF (about176–179⁰C), and the vegetable oil should be on medium heat beforethe frying starts.
• You can make use of an ice cream scoop — or your hands ifpossible — for dropping the batter into the hot oil without getting the deeppan overcrowded.
• As soon as you notice that one side of the buns is lightlybrowned, turn & keep fry till your buns are done. Do note that the whole fryingprocess for each batch will last around 5 min.
• Try to be careful not to fry your buns in oil, which is toohot as this will make the outside of the buns brown and keep the inside raw. Ifyou notice your oil has become too hot in the middle of frying, you can addroom temperature oil (just a little bit) to the hot oil. This will help lowerthe temperature.
• It is best to serve your Nigerian buns warm.

Pleasenote: Let the buns mixture rest for around 10 min before you start frying asthis will enable the gluten in the flour to relax before the frying begins.

How to Store Nigerian Buns

If exposed to air, buns can quickly become stale. Thus, the ideal thing is to let them cool and then wrap them in aluminium foil or cling film. When that is done, keep the buns stored in airtight containers for a maximum of three (3) days.

Youcan also freeze them and store for as much as three (3) months. Consider defrostingbuns slowly in your fridge to avoid condensation that could form on theirsurface.

That is all aboutmaking Nigerian buns. Let’s now proceed to the second type — bread buns — whichare less common in Nigeria than the first one.

Steps to Make Sweet Bread Buns: Ingredientsand Instructions

Everyone loves eating bread, which is a fantastic starter to any meal. Bread is ideal for supper or as a snack. When you’re hungry for an afternoon snack, nothing can be more inviting than the aroma of freshly baked bread. Soft and fluffy, these sweet bread buns are so appetizing and tantalizing that you could eat at least a couple in just a single sitting.

Theyalso have such a delicious taste that they are perfect to be eaten on theirown. You can serve sweet bread buns with navel orange marmalade, vegemite, and nutella.As the aroma still lingers in your kitchen, you will find quite rewarding sittingdown with a good magazine, sipping a cup of coffee, and devouring your freshlybaked bread buns.

Two variations of sweet buns can be made with this recipe. You can use one half of the recipe for making plain sweet buns while you can add coconut toppings to the other half. This sweet bun recipe will allow you make two different kinds of great sweet bread buns, which you can enjoy with your favourite coffee or tea.

Asregards the cook time, do note that the prep time last one hour, 30 minutes andthe cook time 15 minutes. Your buns should be ready in one hour, 45minutes. And you will get a tray of sweet buns within this time frame.

To make this, you will need plain flour, milk powder, caster sugar, egg, butter, yeast, salt, and desiccated coconut.

More specifically, the following ingredients will yield a tray of sweet bread buns:

• 480 grams (around 16.9 oz.) of plain flour
• 3 tbsp. of milk powder
• 4 tbsp. of caster sugar
• 2 teaspoons of dry yeast
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1 egg (this has to be lightly beaten)
• 40 grams of butter chopped
• 1/2 cup of desiccated coconut
• 150ml of lukewarm water

Here are the instructions to make sweet bread buns with these ingredients: 

• Make the dough by siftingthe flour, milk powder, caster sugar as well as salt into a bowl.
• Then, add dry yeast &mix well. Create a well in the flour mixture and add the beaten egg, butter andmix everything properly.
• Add water gradually andmix so you can form a soft dough.
• Now, transfer doughonto a floured surface. The next thing is to knead for twenty (20) min untilthe dough gets elastic and smooth.
• At this juncture, youshould roll the dough into a big ball & place it in a greased bowl. Usecling wrap (or something similar) to cover the bowl and let it be in a warmplace. Allow the dough to rise till it becomes double in size, and this shouldrequire 60 min at least on cooler days.
• As soon as the doughbecomes double in size, use your fist to punch down the dough. You can nowtransfer it to a lightly floured surface and knead for about another 10 min.
• Having done these, dividethe dough into sixteen (16) equal portions and then roll each portion into aball. 

You can also make this with coconut toppings. You may consider making some buns (say 10) with coconut toppings and then leave the rest as plain.

Related:

• How to Make Egusi Soup: Methods & Recipe
• Everything You Need to Know About the Fadama National Project

Here are the steps to make sweet buns with coconut toppings:

• Start by brushing the top of the dough with water & putthe moist surface of the dough into your dessicated coconut.
• Put the dough portions on a baking tray and place this trayin a warm place till the dough portions rise and become double in size.
• Preheat your oven to 180°C (3560F) and brush the plaindoughs using lightly beaten egg. Now, put them in the oven. Note that you don’thave to brush the doughs that have toppings with egg.
• Bake them for around 12–15 min till the top of the breadbuns becomes golden brown and remove your sweet buns from the oven. You can nowallow them to cool slightly.

You can enjoy your sweet bread buns with homemade lemon jam when they are still warm.

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