Coffee Bread Loaf

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Thanks to the water roux technique, I am now feeling quite comfortable baking bread. For some reason, I find that the sense of accomplishment in churning out a soft, well formed bread is immensely greater than for example, turning out a batch of macarons.
I have never quite feared the macarons but for the longest time, I had been afraid to bake bread. My bread making adventure debuted with the sweet soft buns. Working with a smaller format is more manageable and helps to build up experience and confidence. When my first sandwich loaf, the Hokkaido Bread came out well, I knew I am hooked.

I have bookmarked so many bread loaves to bake and can't wait to get through them one by one!  This is supposed to be a Coffee Loaf but unfortunately, since I do not drink instant coffee, I tried to substitute the instant coffee granules with my machine brewed Expresso. The colour is pale and the flavour is weak... I shall remember to stash away some instant coffee packs from the office next time to repeat this again. Nevertheless, the texture is wonderfully soft and when paired with the Chocolate Honey glaze left over from the baby donuts, this makes one of the best breakfast treat ever! The Chocolate Honey glaze is 100x better than Nutella!

So if you have yet to try hands at bread making, follow my foot steps... using a tacky tagline- if I can do it, you most definitely can too!


Coffee Bread Loaf (Adapted from 65C Tangzhong Bread) 
Recipe 
(A)
190g              Bread flour
44g                Castor sugar
2g                  Salt
4g                  Instant yeast

(B)
20g                Egg (beaten)
50g                Milk
12g                Instant coffee granule (I used 12g of Expresso coffee instead)
60g                Water Roux dough (tangzhong)

(C)
20g                Unsalted butter

Almond flakes for garnish

(D)
Tangzhong (Water roux)
Bread flour          50g
Water                  250g


Method :
1. Prepare Tangzhong (Water Roux) 1 day before.  Mix (D) together and cook over low heat until 65C - stirring all the time while cooking. When it is cooked, the mixture should look like starchy glue and you should be able to see the stirring lines in the dough. Remove from heat and cool down at room temperature. Store it in the refrigerator for 12 hours.
2. Mix (A) together in a mixing bowl with (B) (take care to separate salt from yeast). Using a dough hook mix at medium speed until the dough comes together to form a ball. 
3. Add in softened butter and continue kneading with dough hook for 20 mins until window pane stage. 
4. Gather the dough from the mixing bowl and knead for 2-3 mins by hand on a lightly floured table top. 
5. Form the dough into a round ball and place it in a lightly oiled bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Allow to proof at room temperature (28C) for 40mins.
6. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured table top and knead quickly by hand. (2mins) Divide the dough into 10 equal portions of 36g each. 
7. Rest the divided dough for 10mins. Place the 12 dough portions in a loaf pan in a 5X2 configuration. 
Allow the dough to proof to fill up almost 90% of your loaf pan. (I just rested it for 60mins)
8. In the mean time, preheat oven to 170C fan mode. 
9. Brush (7) with egg wash and sprinkle almond flakes. (I forgot to brush the bread with egg wash, hence my almond flakes did not stick well to the bread) 
10. Bake for 20mins. 
11. Cool down completely before slicing.