I would like to show you how to make my Ice Cream Buns. These are soft bread buns filled with crème légère and frozen. Perfect for the summer and a wonderful little snack any time!
During my home baking journey, I have been learning how to make some of my favourite little bread snacks and treats. One such snack is Japanese Kurimpan also know as Cream Pan. This is a Japanese bread similar to shokupan (Japanese Milk Bread) which is filled with custard cream. At first I stuck to the traditional method. Then I added whipping cream to the custard cream to make a Crème Légère. I also changed the bread recipe to make it lighter, by replacing the milk in the dough with water.
Why are they Ice Cream Buns?
You can eat the buns straight away or you can chill them in fridge before eating. As I have made so many, we couldn’t possibly eat them all so I decided to freeze some. When we came to eat them again, I let them defrost for around an hour. I discovered after one hour, the bread was lovely and soft again albeit cold and the cream was still frozen, yet I could easily bite through it. This happy little accident lead to my Ice Cream Buns!!
What is Crème Légère?
Crème Légère or Light Cream in English, is a mix of Pastry Cream (Crème Pâtissière) and fresh whipping cream. It is a wonderful filling and very luxurious.
Ice Cream Buns
Equipment
- 3 Mixing Bowl
- 2 Baking Tray
- 1 Bread Cutter
- 1 Oven
- 1 Piping bag
- 1 Spatula
- 1 Whisk
- 1 Milk Pan or Small Sauce Pan
Ingredients
Bread
- 200 g Bread Flour or Strong Flour(100%)
- 2 g Quick Yeast (1%)
- 3 g Salt(1.5%)
- 12 g Sugar(6%)
- 130 ml Water(65%) lukewarm
- 10 g Butter(5%)
Crème Légère
- 2 large Egg Yolks
- 35 g Sugar
- 1 Pinch Salt
- 1 ½ tsp Vanilla Bean Paste
- 9 g Plain Flour
- 9 g Cornflour
- 200 ml Milk
- 10 g Unsalted Butter
- 100 ml Whipping Cream
- 10 g Sugar for whipping cream
Instructions
Bread – Part 1
- In a mixing bowl add the bread flour, then in separate areas of the bowl add in the yeast & salt, sugar. Using your hand or spatula, give all the dry ingredients a good mix. Next add the butter and water into it. Using your hand or spatula mix until there are no dry bits in the bowl.
- Turn the dough out onto the work surface and start to knead for 10 – 15 minutes. Check the gluten cut a piece of the dough and spread it very thin, if your can see your finger though the dough and it does not break easily, this means the gluten is ready to do first ferment. Roll the dough into a ball and cover with the wrap or a plastic bag and leave it to ferment in a warm place for 60 minutes or doubled in size.
Pastry Cream
- Whilst the dough is resting, add the egg yolks, salt and sugar into a mixing bowl. Use a whisk mix all ingredients until they become light yellow. Then add the vanilla paste and mix well.
- Sieve the plain flour and cornflour and add into the batter and mix well.
- Ready a milk pan, add the milk, using a low heat to warm the milk until it starts to have small bubbles (around 50 – 60°C). Then turn off the heat. Next pour it slowly into the batter and mix well. Pour the mixture back into the pan.
- Over a medium heat, whisk the pastry cream. It will start to become thick, do not stop here, continue whisking it until it becomes smooth, then turn off the heat. Add the butter and whisk it until the pastry cream is nice and smooth.
- Pour the pastry cream on to a baking tray. Put some wrap on the top, making sure there is no air between the wrap and the pastry cream. You need to cool it quickly. This can be done by putting ice into a food bag and placing it directly on the top of the wrap covered pastry cream. Once it has cooled down place it into fridge. (If you used ice, remove before putting it in the fridge)
Bread – Part 2
- After 60 mins, finger test (see notes) to check if the dough has rested enough. Turn it out onto the work surface (if the dough is sticky, dust a little bread flour on the surface). Use your fingers gentle push the air out and divide into 8 equal pieces.
- Roll each dough piece into a ball, then let it to rest for 15 minutes cover with wrap.
- After 15 minutes, gently push air out and roll the each dough piece into a ball again. Cover with wrap or plastic bag and ferment it again for 30 – 40 minutes or until doubled in size. Now is a good time to Preheat your oven 190°C.
- Once the dough has been fully rested, remove the wrap. Sieve strong flour on to the top of each dough ball.Reduce the oven to 170°C and bake for 15 minutes. Once you take bread out of the oven gently tap the tray and leave them to cool down completely.
Crème Légère
- Take the pastry cream out of the fridge. Put it back into a mixing bowl and mix it until smooth again.
- In a separate mixing bowl add the whipping cream and sugar. Place the mixing bowl into ice water. Using either an electric whisk or hand whisk, whisk the whipping cream until it becomes stiff. Then mix it with pastry cream. Next add the Crème Légère into a piping bag so it is ready to use.
Filling the buns
- Using a chopstick or something similar, push gently into the side of each bun and give it a gentle wiggle to open up the bun inside.
- The put the nozzle of the piping bag into each bun and fill with crème légère. You will feel the bun inflate. I recommend using 30 to 35g of crème légère. You can put more or less. If you over fill, it will come out.
- You can eat the buns straight away, or you can chill them in the fridge. Or better yet freeze them. Then allow to defrost for 1 hour in the fridge. The bread should be lovely and soft again and the crème légère still frozen.Enjoy your your cream buns or ice cream buns 🙂
