Nutella and chestnut danish bun ( water roux method )

This is one of the craziest blunder I have ever made, to mistake 22g of butter with 220g. Instead of double checking the unusual amount, I believed my 'eyes' and if it had not been for the limited amount of butter at hand, I would definitely have  'clogged up' my arteries eating what is potentially an innocent looking bun.

Still, no matter - since 150g ( thankfully that is all I have ) of butter did produce some sort of danish pastry, slightly crispy and still retaining its bread like character.  This mistake would have been easily spotted if I had 1) double checked Grace's blog 2) changed to my reading glasses - yeah, I am that old 3) used my hands to knead an impossibly buttery dough instead of using the bread machine.

It's my lucky day still because the 'minor' deviation means changing the title from 'Nutella and chestnut twirl bun' to 'Nutella and chestnut danish bun' to reflect the 'tweak' in a major ingredient.

Another little discovery is finding a new way of shelling raw chestnut. I poked a hole with a sharp knife on every chestnut, put the whole lot of them in a microwave ware with enough water to cover the nuts and nuked them for about 6 minutes.  Drain nuts, cool, chopped nuts into 2 and the cooked chestnut just drops off. Yes - it is that simple! Just remember to poke a hole or risk an exploding chestnut in the oven. The entire process took a mere 15 minutes, easy peasy.

Water roux :
Unlike previous water roux preparation, I did a little calculation using the 5:1 water:bread flour ratio and cook the mixture till it reached 65C. OK, I didn't actually take the temperature this time, since I have been doing this for the nth time. Rather, I stirred until the mixture makes trails with the whisk.  I left it covered for 1 hour to cool while doing a thousand chores in the house.  Indeed certain things get better with practice.

This narration is a tad lengthy today not because of complexity but because I am gloating over my accidental success. So, please bear with me.

Makes 9 danish buns, about 290 calories each, a mini meal in itself. Adapted from gracekitchencorner.blogspot.com, one of my favorite food bloggers.

Ingredients :

(A) 210g bread flour / 56g self raising flour / 20g milk powder / 42g sugar / 1/4 teaspoon salt / 7g instant yeast
(B) 30 g egg / 85g warm water / 84g water roux (refer to water roux recipe above)
© 150g ( original version calls for 22 g but you call your end product a bun in that case )
(D) some nutella and chopped cooked chestnut


How I made it:
    1. Combine  ingredients (A) and (B) in bread machine receptacle. Knead till it forms a dough ball. Add  butter (C) little by little and continue the kneading process until smooth and elastic and the dough no longer sticks to the side of the mixing bowl. ( Since the bread machine kneads for 20 minutes, I reset the machine and do the knead for another 10 minutes )
    2. Let it proof for 40 minutes in the receptacle.
    3. Divide the dough into 9 portions , dividing using a knife. Round them into small balls and rest for 10 minutes.
    4. Roll out the dough into a  longish shape. Spread some nutella and chopped chestnut. Roll bun up tightly. Place them into muffin cups. Revealing ends at the top of the muffin cups.
    5. Proof for 40 minutes.
    6. Egg wash the top of the bun and sprinkle some chopped chestnuts.
    7. Preheat oven at 200 C. Bake at  180C   for 15-17 minutes. Bon appétit!