Made a green tea bread recently. Love the color.

And this time round, I used a new recipe / method - 冷藏液種, taken from Bernice's blog. I'm supposed to mix the starter dough using my mixer... but I mis-read the instructions *oops*, and ended up with no bubbles in the pre-fermented dough (refer here). Luckily, the bread still turned out soft.

As the bread was a success, I decided to make another loaf for my friends. This time, I used natural green tea powder, instead of bakeable green tea powder. I've been feeling uncomfortable whenever I read the ingredients list for the bakeable green tea powder... However, when I innocently replaced the bakeable green tea with natural green tea, the bread turned out brown with no hints of green tea smell.

I was shocked. And all along what I thought was natural turned out otherwise. I needed some time to digest this news, and decide if I want to eat green tea bread and cakes again.

But I love green tea! My sister pointed out perhaps I should check out what the Japanese bakers used for their desserts. Or did I buy the wrong type of powder?



This bread is slightly sweeter. Tastes good on its own or with a slab of salted butter. The salted butter provides a constrast to the sweetness of the bread.

Recipe:
170g bread flour
50g caster sugar
2g salt
4g instant yeast
1 egg
25g unsalted butter
37g fresh milk
150g pre-fermented dough
5g green tea powder

• Knead all the ingredients together, except the butter.
• Add in the butter after gluten has developed.
• Continue to knead till the dough reaches the window-pane stage.
• Place in a lightly greased bowl, and let it proof till double in size.
• Punch down the dough. Cut into 3 portions. Round it and let it rest for 15 mins.
• Flatten and roll each portions like a swiss roll. Place in bread tin and let rise till it reaches 80% full.
• Bake at 170C for 45 mins. 

Pre-ferment dough - enough to make 3 loaves, using a 450g bread tin

300g bread flour
300g water
1g instant yeast

• Mix the yeast, using a mixer till it's well-dissolved into the flour (approx 15 mins).  
• Let it proof for 1 hour at room temperature. Put into the fridge for at least 16 hours before using.