Bumbu Dasar (Indonesian Basic Spice Paste)

Every culture has its basic traditional recipes. Same as the Italians who have their basic spaghetti sauce, Indonesian also have a basic spice paste that is need to know how to prepare. It is called basic because it is the seasoning bases of almost all Indonesian dishes.

Well, as an Indonesian, the basic recipe for Indonesian is a spice paste recipe. What we call bumbu dasar or spice paste is used in a lot of our traditional cooking. There has been many variations to this spice paste recipe. The core ingredients to any basic spice paste recipe has to include shallots and garlic. With that, you can pretty much add any other spice or aromatics to suit your needs and taste buds. 

To make basic spice paste, actually you should really pound all ingredients using a mortar and pestle. It is pretty time consuming and labour intensive, but the flavours, aroma and paste that ensues is definitely worth it. Until now, my grandmothers and my mom still using traditional mortar and pestle when grounded the spice. Using a food processor/blender will cut out the preparation time but it won’t generate the same flavours as a pounded spice paste. Most of my time in kitchen I use mortar and pestle, but if I made in such a huge amount of spice to ground I will use food processor instead of that traditional way. You can use which one that you feel comfort. 

If you using a blender, the order of processing the spices is much the same as using a mortar, but in some cases we might need to add some liquid to keep the blades of the machine turning during the blending process. The liquid could be oil if the spice paste needs to be fried or either coconut milk, stock or water if the spice paste is to be simmered.

Basically,  there are 3 variations of basic spice paste and it varies depends on the colour of the paste. They are White Basic Spice Paste, Yellow Basic Spice Paste, and Red Basic Spice Paste. Each paste become seasoning of different Indonesian dishes. For my Indonesian friends, I add a table in this post of different use of these 3 variations of basic spice paste.

Depending on what you are cooking, you can add the appropriate ingredients to it. For example, if you were planning on making Opor Ayam (Indonesian Chicken in Coconut Gravy), you would need to add in and pound some coriander seed, pepper powder, and lesser galangal. The possibilities is up to your choice.

In this post, I’ll show you one the recipes which suit me well between some of recipes that I have ever tried before. I got the recipe from "Resep Favorit D'ez Kitchen di Dunia Maya" by R. A Estherlita Suryopitro with some modification. I usually made this basic spice paste when I planned to be busy with some of work and don't have long time to be in the kitchen. Like now, it is Ramadhan, fasting month for Muslim. I made spice paste stock for a month. Using this easy method I feel more practical when preparing food for my family.

Bumbu Dasar Putih

(Indonesian Basic White Spice Sauce)

Ingredients:

• 200 grams shallots
• 100 grams cloves garlic
• 75 grams ginger
• 25 grams candlenuts (toasted before for better flavour)
• Cooking oil

Directions:

• If you use a mortar and pestle, the order to be followed when grinding spice paste ingredients is the hard items first, candle-nuts and ginger. You can scraped the ginger to make the grinding process easier. Once all of these are quite smooth, then add ingredients that are full of moisture, such as shallots and garlic.  
• If you use a food processor just blend all the ingredients until smooth. 
• Stir fry the paste with some cooking oil. Heat up until the water that comes out when you grinding the spice dissolves. Turn off the heat and leave the paste cold.
• While waiting the paste cold, sterilize the jar that you want to use to keep the paste (I suggest using glass jar such as mason jars). Sterilize it in boiling water for 15 minutes. 
• After the paste cold, transfer it into the mason jars. For one recipe in here I use the 16 oz Regular Mouth Ball Mason Jars. Keep it in chiller or freeze it.

*****

Bumbu Dasar Kuning

(Indonesian Basic Yellow Spice Sauce)

Ingredients:

• 200 grams shallots
• 100 grams cloves garlic
• 150 grams turmeric roots (toasted for better flavour and colour)
• 2 tsp ground turmeric powder (add if you feel the colour is not too yellow)
• 75 grams ginger
• 25 grams candlenuts (toasted before for better flavour)
• 4 Indonesian bay leaves (Daun Salam)
• 2 stalk lemon grass
• 2 kaffir lime leaves
• Cooking oil

Directions:

• If you use a mortar and pestle, the order to be followed when grinding spice paste ingredients is the hard items first, candle-nuts, turmeric and ginger. You can scraped the ginger and turmeric to make the grinding process easier. Once all of these are quite smooth, then add ingredients that are full of moisture, such as shallots and garlic.  
• If you use a food processor just blend all the ingredients until smooth. 
• Stir fry the paste with some cooking oil. Add Indonesian bay leaves, kaffir lime leaves, and lemon grass. Heat up until the water that comes out when you grinding the spice dissolves. Turn off the heat and leave the paste cold.
• While waiting the paste cold, sterilize the jar that you want to use to keep the paste (I suggest using glass jar such as mason jars). Sterilize it in boiling water for 15 minutes. 
• After the paste cold, transfer it into the mason jars. For one recipe in here I use the 16 oz Regular Mouth Ball Mason Jars. Keep it in chiller or freeze it

*****

Bumbu Dasar Merah

(Indonesian Basic Red Spice Sauce)

Ingredients:

• 160 grams shallots
• 80 grams cloves garlic
• 60 grams ginger
• 20 grams candlenuts (toasted before for better flavour)
• 8 fresh red chilli
• 4 dried red chilli (to make the taste more spicy and the colour more red) - optional
• 1 tbs fermented shrimp paste 
• 4 medium sized tomatoes, diced
• 4 Indonesian bay leaves (Daun Salam)
• 2 stalk lemon grass
• Cooking oil

Directions:

• If you use a mortar and pestle, the order to be followed when grinding spice paste ingredients is the hard items first, candle-nuts, turmeric and ginger. You can scraped the ginger and turmeric to make the grinding process easier. Once all of these are quite smooth, then add ingredients that are full of moisture, such as shallots, garlic, red chilli and tomatoes. If you use dried red chilli make sure to soaked it before grind it. 
• If you use a food processor just blend all the ingredients until smooth. 
• Stir fry the paste with some cooking oil. Add Indonesian bay leaves and lemon grass. Heat up until the water that comes out when you grinding the spice dissolves. Turn off the heat and leave the paste cold.
• While waiting the paste cold, sterilize the jar that you want to use to keep the paste (I suggest using glass jar such as mason jars). Sterilize it in boiling water for 15 minutes. 
• After the paste cold, transfer it into the mason jars. For one recipe in here I use the 16 oz Regular Mouth Ball Mason Jars. Keep it in chiller or freeze it.

Bubur Ketan Hitam (Black Glutinous Rice Porridge with Coconut Milk)

Black glutinous rice porridge is one of famous Indonesian desserts. This porridge is very easily found in across the nation. Generally, it is served in combination with the mung bean porridge and coconut milk sauce. We can enjoy this street food any time because although it is classified as dessert but many Indonesian eat it for breakfast, for supper or sometimes as snack. It is so delicious to eat in cold or hot. I prefer to eat this porridge in cold, add some ice or eat it right after keep it for a while in refrigerator. 

In Indonesian culinary, black glutinous rice porridge has so many names. In Sumatra (even in Malaysia and Singapore) is known as Bubur Pulut Hitam. While in other part of Indonesia, in Bali, it is known as Bubur Injin. Bubur means porridge in Indonesian and Malay. We can also find this kind of porridge in Thailand with name Khao Neow Dam, served with coconut milk and an extra sprinkling of sesame seeds or toasted coconut grated.  

I love to eat this porridge without addition of mung bean porridge. The taste will be more crunchy but soft inside and watery, of course it is so delicious sweet dessert. I also love to see the colour combination in this porridge, it is harmony between black and white, its glossy blackness and simple white makes it both alluring everyone who eat it for the first time.

So here is the recipe..

Please remember to take enough preparation time to soaking the black glutinous rice a night before you cook them. I prefer to soak it a night to make the rice softer when is cooked.

 

Bubur Ketan Hitam

(Black Glutinous Rice Porridge with Coconut Milk)

Resources : NCC

Ingredients:

Porridge

• 200 grams black glutinous rice
• 150 grams sugar (can be substituted with coconut sugar or palm sugar)
• 2 litres water
• 2 Pandan leaves 
• pinch of salt

Coconut Milk Sauce:

• 250 ml thick coconut milk
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 Pandan leaves

Directions:

• Run your fingers through the rice and check for any pebbles or other noticeable impurities. Rinse the rice a few times until the water clears. Cover with at least 2 inches of water and allow to soak 4 or more hours, or overnight. The rice will absorb water and grow in size. Then, drain the rice. 
• Cook with water and pandan leaves, bring to boil. Reduce heat to simmer and cook partially covered until soft and thick.  Add sugar and salt, continue cooking with stirring it occasionally until the porridge thicken and sugar dissolved. Turn off the heat. Set aside. 
• For coconut milk sauce, cook thick coconut milk with salt and pandan leaves. We don't add any sugar in this sauce to make it contrast with the sweetened black glutinous rice. 
• When ready to serve, dish the porridge into individual serving bowls and dribble some sauce over each serving.

Ayam Goreng Crispy

 

Maybe you will think that crispy fried chicken is not kind of health food that we can include as our family menu everyday. But in my home, this crispy fried chicken is one of menu that is usually served at home. My son love to eat fried chicken and about twice a week he will ask me to cook this. I try to cook it by myself and not buy in fast food restaurant (that is very unhealthy with high MSG, bad oil, trans fat and something like that). For the first time, I don't have any idea how to make delicious crispy fried chicken like fast food restaurant sell. Trial and error each recipe that I find and here is my favorites recipe ever. I feel so comfort when I can cook it by myself, I can control the ingredient, not using seasoning powder who contain high MSG or sometimes if I have to use it I only use in very little amount. Because the one who eat this is my son, I try to use good quality cooking oil for him. 

I got the recipe from book "60 Resep Masakan Favorit Anti Gagal" by Fatmah Bahalwan from NCC. Very easy to make. You can choose which one suit you the most, pan-fry it or deep-fry it. I prefer the deep-fry method because it makes the fried chicken crispier. But of course, deep-fry will need excessive oil consumption. The exact amount may vary depending on cook time and temperature, ingredient density, and the specific type of oil used. Hope one day I can buy my own air-fryer Phillips, can fry something in healthy way, LOL.

When cooking fried chicken, flavor is important, that’s true. But a flavorful fried chicken is a mere shadow of its full potential if it lacks a crackling kick. It’s an unwritten rule: fried chicken needs to have a crispy crust—always! To enhance the flavor of fried chicken just make sure you get enough time to marinade the chicken. If I have free time I will marinade the chicken a night before. But sometimes, if I am in hurry, I just cook the chicken with the spices and some herbs (you can use any herb, I usually use Basil and some thyme). Let them cool for a while then dip in the crispy flour and the batter then fry it ;)

 

Ayam Goreng Crispy (Crispy Fried Chicken)

Ingredients:

• 1 chicken (about 1,5 kg), cut into you desired 
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbs chicken powder
• 1/2 tsp ground pepper
• 1/2 tsp seasoning powder (optional)
• cooking oil

Crispy Flour:

• 1 kg flour
• 2 tbs tapioca flour
• 6 tbs baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp chicken powder
• 1 tsp ground pepper

For batter:

• 1 egg white
• 1 tbs chicken powder
• 500 ml water

Direction:

• Place all the chicken in large bowl and toss with salt, chicken powder, ground pepper, and seasoning powder. Allow chicken to marinade for at least 15 minutes, up to overnight would be better.
• For batter : Whick egg white, add chicken powder and water. Set aside.
• Prepare the seasoned and crispy flour. Iin large bowl, simply mix all the ingredients. Set aside.
• Heat the cooking oil, you can use pan-fry or deep-fry but I would suggest it would be better using deep-fry. If you choose use pan-fry make sure the cooking oil is one inch deep. If you want to deep-fry it, just pour as much oil as is needed to completely cover the chicken parts. Let the cooking oil hot before putting the chicken into the fryer.
• One by one, roll the chicken pieces in seasoned-crispy flour. Then dip them into the batter, then in the flour again for one last time. Just make sure all their parts are covered. Let the chicken rest for a while to allot the coating stick to the chicken and the season come inside the chicken.
• Fry the chicken pieces in batches until they turn in golden brown. Place aside in cooling rack and allow them to drain. Ready to eat! 

Kepiting Saos Padang (Padangese Hot and Spicy Chilli Crab)

When I was still lived in Pontianak (the capital city of West Kalimantan), crab is one of my family's favorite seafood. If my parents went into local market and found the big crab sell or when came from Singkawang, they would not leave not to buy those crabs. In Kalimantan we can buy big and good quality crab. It is very different what we face in Java island now. It is so hard to get any good quality crab and the price is so expensive, a kilogram crab in here almost as same as a kilogram beef. But don't worry, we still can eat good crabs if we go to a seafood restaurant that get their crabs from Kalimantan. If you live in East Java, of course you will know the most famous seafood restaurant in here who made crabs dish as their signature dish, "Kepiting Cak Gundul". My friend said that they get their crabs from Tarakan, a city in East Kalimantan. 

At home, my mother usually cook crabs by boiling it with garlic and ginger then only then eat those by dipping in sweet soy sauce or tomato sauce. Sometimes she made crab with sweet and sour tomato sauce or corn soup with crab meat. But in Indonesia, actually there are so many recipes that use crabs as main ingredients that you can try at home. One of them is this Indonesian Chilli Crab or Padangese Hot and Spicy Chilli Sauce. I never eat Indonesian Chilli Crab before. Due to my curiousness, then when I went to market, I bought some crabs. Original recipe from Resep Keluarga Nugraha in here. But I modified this recipe to suit me.

I prefer to boil the crab first before mix it in the cooked sauce. Beside boil it you can also fried the crab before cook it with sauce. How to clean crabs? You can check it out in this blog. The tutorial how to clean crab is complete there (added with picture). Great tips for you...

Padangese hot and spicy chilli crab is one of very famous dish from Padang (a city in West Sumatra) beside Indonesian Beef Rendang (stewed beef in brown coconut curry). Of course, because it comes from Padang, the taste of this dish is really hot and spicy. For spicy lover this dish will be one of must-to-eat-in-Indonesia. But despite the frills of "Padang" in the name of the dish, I hope you will not overestimate to get this dish in all Padangese restaurant in all over Indonesia. This dish only common in Chinese seafood restaurant. Beside with crabs, sometimes they use shrimp, clamp or mussel, but as alternatives you can use fish too as main ingredients in this dish.  You can enjoy this Indonesian chilli crab with warm rice or a plate of Mantou (Chinese steamed buns). So yummy...

Indonesian Chili Crab 

(Padangese Hot and Spicy Chilli Crab)

Ingredients:

• 2 big-sized crabs (about 500 gr), cleaned, boiled
• 5 tbs tomato sauce
• 2 tbs chilli sauce (Indonesian chilli sauce)
• 4 tbs oyster sauce
• 150 ml water
• 1 1/2 tbs corn starch, dissolve in a tbs of water
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1/2 tsp lime juice

Finely ground:

• 5 shallots (can be change with 1 small-sized onion, sliced)
• 3 garlic
• 3-4 red chillies
• 3 bird-eye chillies (you can add more bird-eye chillies if you want more spicy)
• 3 cm turmeric
• 1 tsp pepper
• salt and sugar as desired

Directions:

• In a large skillet, heat up the cooking oil in medium-high heat. Saute the ground spice until fragrant. Add the tomato sauce, chilli sauce and oyster sauce. Stirring often and cooked until well done.
• Add the crabs, stir it. Add water and bring to boil in a high heat. Adjust the taste with add some sugar and salt. Wait until bubbling.
• Add the dissolve corn starch, stir it and cook it in low-heat until the sauce come inside the crabs meat and let the sauce thicken. Add lime juice, stir it for a while then turn off the heat. Ready to be served with hot steamed rice or hot Mantaou. 

Siomay Bandung (Bandung Steamed Dumplings with Peanut Sauce)

 

I don't know exactly since when I love to eat this street food. Siomay is similar to Chinese Dim Sum. It is an Indonesian steamed fish dumpling served with Peanut Sauce. A word of Siomay itself can be derived from Chinese Shumai (siu mai or shaomai), a traditional Chinese Dumpling that is considered to have originated from Inner Mongolia.

This traditional dim sum is a popular meal in Indonesia as street food. There are so many types of siomay variations in Indonesian cuisine based on the meat that is used for the filling. We can use king mackerel fish, chicken, shrimp, crab, or mixture of chicken and shrimp. As the recipe I share in here is using mixture of chicken and shrimp as filling. Siomay Bandung is the most famous variety of siomay in Indonesian cuisine.

Siomay Bandung is served with tofu, hard-boiled egg and vegetables such as potato, cabbage, bitter-melon, and the most important component, that is Peanut Sauce. We can add some seasoning for peanut sauces such as chili, lime juice and a little bit sweet soy sauce.

The original recipe is come from NCC. But I made some change to the original recipe due to my liking. And also the recipe of Peanut Sauce or Peanut Sambal. I made my own recipe.

Siomay Bandung

Bandung Steamed Dumplings with Peanut Sauce

 

Ingredients: 

• 400 g chicken meat, paste
• 100 g shrimp/king mackerel fish, paste
• 2 tbs shallots, grated
• 1 tbs garlic, mashed
• 2 tsp ground white pepper
• 3 tbs sugar
• 3 tsp salt
• 1 tbs cooking oil or sesame oil
• 3 eggs
• 400 g chayotes, grated
• 450 g tapioca starch
• Wonton skins
• 1 medium sized bitter-melon
• 1 medium sized cabbage
• Some hard-boiled eggs
• Tofu

Peanut Sauce:

• 500 g roasted peanut
• 200 g red chilies 
• 3 garlic
• 3 shallots
• 2 tbs Javanese tamarind juice
• 2 tbs salt
• 7 tbs coconut sugar
• 1,5 liter water

 Directions:

1. In a bowl, combine chicken meat and shrimp paste with shallot, garlic, white pepper, sugar, salt, and cooking oil. I used food processor to combine it. Then add egg and mix well. 
2. Add grated chayotes and mix well. Add tapioca starch, mix well. Set aside.
3. Grease the steamer with small amount of cooking oil to make the dumplings will not sticky when steaming. 
4. Siomay : Take a piece of wonton skin, scoop about 1 tbs of filling, shape it using hands. Repeat until all the wonton skin are used up. Steam for 20 minutes.
5. Potato :  Boiled potatoes until half-cooked then peel the potato's skin. Cut in half and scrape a portion of potato side and fill it with the filling. Steam it. If you want simple way, just boiled it and peel the potato skin without fill it with the feeling.
6. Tofu : Cut in half and scrape a portion of tofu and fill it with the filling. Steam. You can also just cut in half and directly steam it.
7. Bitter melon : Cut in several pieces (as your liking). Scrape the seed portion and fill it in with the filling. Steam it.
8. Cabbage : Cut in several pieces as your liking and steam it. Some people usually make the cabbage roll and fill it with the filling. But I choose simple way, just steam it with fill nothing.
9. Egg : hard boiled eggs 
10. Peanut Sauce (Peanut Sambal) :
    
    • Process the peanuts in food processor until smooth. Transfer it into a medium bowl. Set aside.
    • Process red chilies, garlic and shallots until smooth. 
    • Heat a skillet and add some cooking oil. Stir fry the smooth red chilies, garlic, and shallot until fragrant. Add the ground peanuts, mix well. Pour water, mix it. Add salt, coconut sugar, tamarind juice, mix well. Wait until the sauce become thick then turn off the heat. Set aside.

Serving suggestions: place all dumplings on a plate. Pour some peanut sauce and drizzle over lime juice, sweet soy sauce, and some ground chilies or you can use chili sauce from the store. 

Blueberry Cheese Streusel Cake

One thing that I can't refuse to do is when my son asking me to cook or bake something for him. He usually accompany me when I read recipe book or searching new recipe to try in my little kitchen. He doesn't just accompany me, but he also randomly pointed cake or bread that looks interest and yummy in his opinion then said "Bunda, please make this cake/bread". So here it is one of the cake that he pointed when we saw cooking magazine together.

This cake is so yummy, truly i love it. I always tempted to any cake with cheese inside. The streusel gives the cake that extra crunch and sweetness while on its own, it tastes nice and light. This cake suitable to eat in the morning with your tea or coffee. I can't say no to eat this cake, for temporary just forget your diet program, LOL. The recipe is so quick and easy to make, everyone who is still in beginner level of baking like me will love this recipe.

It was so difficult to find frozen blueberry in my city. Sometimes i can find frozen blueberry in famous Asian market in here, Lai-lai but if i am not mistaken it has been 6 months later since the last I see frozen blueberry pack in frozen food section. Poor me.. It would be so nice if I can make my own blueberry jam but it's okay. I still can use any kind of blueberry jam that I can find in local market. Then I use St. Dalfour from France, my favourite fruit jam's brand.

Happy weekend!!

Blueberry Cheese Streusel Cake

from: Sedap Magazine

Ingredients:

• 100 g white cooking chocolate, melted
• 200 g unsalted butter
• 125 g castor sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 4 eggs
• 180 g all purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 50 ml fresh milk
• 50 g cheddar cheese, grated
• 100 g blueberry jam

Streusel topping:

• 60 g cold unsalted butter
• 1 tbsp sugar powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 100 g all purpose flour

Directions:

• Streusel topping, in a medium bowl, mix together sugar powder, flour, and salt. Cut in butter using fork until well combined and mixture resembles course crumbs.
• Preheat the oven 180 degree Celcius and grease a 22x22x4 cm baking pan with parchment paper.
• In a medium bowl, mix using mixer in medium speed unsalted butter, castor sugar, and salt together. Add melted white coking chocolate. Mix well.
• Add egg one by one alternates with some of flour and mix well. Add the rest of the flour, baking powder and fresh milk, mix until combined. Add grated cheddar cheese. Mix well.
• Add blueberry jam in some part of dough, whisk the jam in dough only for a while, until you can see the tinge of the jam in the dough. Pour into prepared baking pan. Sprinkle the streusel topping on top.
• Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into centre of the cakes come out clean. 
• Allow to cool at least 10 minutes before cutting it into desired size.

Roti Kasur (Sweet Bread Rolls)

Making bread for me is like a nightmare. I never succeed make it without history of failure, except when I made it with my mother. Don't know why every time I tried to knead the dough it was not go well. I am not expert in kneading the dough. I am hopeless in bread making. 

But you know, my son really love bread so much, and always ask me to buy bread for him. Whenever we pass by our favorite bakery shop, he always said that "Mom, bread....". Then, I try to force myself to boost my spirit to learn how to make bread well. I bought baking book, read many resource in internet about that and of course learning by doing. However how hard I tried it ended nothing. Hence, I choose shortcut way, I bought a bread-maker machine, LOL. That machine will be my savior in making bread.

And here it is finally I CAN MAKE BREAD by myself and assisted by my Kenwood bread-maker machine, LOL. 

I made this bread using Komachi, a wheat premium flour brand from Japan. Actually you can use any kind of high-protein wheat flour that is available in your city. I am using dark cooking chocolate and cheese for the filling. But you can use anything that you like such as jam, melted chocolate, and so on. Above the bread roll I only spread chocolate jimmies and grated cheese. I got the recipe from Natural Cooking Club. It turned out really god, I love the tenderness of this bread. This bread is a good choice if you want to make bread as your family breakfast menu.

 

Sweet Bread Rolls

Source : Natural Cooking Club

Ingredients:

• 500 g bread flour
• 3 eggs yolk
• 100 g sugar
• 30 g milk powder
• 11 g instant yeast
• 5 g salt
• 250 ml cooking water
• 100 g butter
• 1/2 tsp bread improver (optional)

For filling : 

• Dark cooking chocolate
• Grated cheese

For the topping:

• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tbs cooking water

Directions:

1. In a bowl, combine bread flour, sugar, milk powder, and instant yeast. Make a well in the center. Whisk and combine well all egg yolk and water, then add into the well of dry ingredients. Mix and knead it until half elastic, add butter and salt. Continue to knead until the dough is no longer sticky but elastic enough. You want the dough to be elastic. So if you were to take a part of it and stretch it out, you can stretch it to a very thin membrane without it breaking. When you poke a hole in the thin membrane, it should form a close to perfect circle.
2. Divide the dough into small pieces of dough about 40 g, make ball shape. Cover with cling wrap and let rest for 15 minutes. Deflate the dough, fill with the filling, make ball shape again and place the balls into baking pan that has been spread by butter or lined with parchment paper. Leave it for second round of proofing about 30 minutes until double in size.
3. Whisk the topping ingredient: egg, salt and water in a small bowl. Brush egg wash on the surface of the bun and spread chocolate jimmies or grated cheese. Bake in a preheated oven 180 degree Celsius for 15 minutes or until the surface golden brown. Transfer into wire rack and let cool completely.

Directions if using bread machine:

• Put in the order listed below:
• Eggs yolk, whisked with cooking water
• Bread flour, milk powder, bread improver. Combine well and put inside the machine.
• Sugar (on top of the flour in one corner)
• Salt (on top of the flour in another corner)
• Butter (on top of the flour in corner, at other side corner where you put salt)
• Instant yeast (on top of the flour in center, make well and put into the well)

• Set the setting to "Dough"
• Wait until the dough process done and continue with manual directions as you can read above.