Mugis – laminated soft cream buns

Instructions

FIRST DAY

Prepare the dough.

1. In the bowl of the mixer add the flour, water, egg, powdered milk, honey, sugar, yeast and salt. Knead in a spiral mixer or in a regular mixer with the dough hook on speed 2 until you get a dough that is almost developed. It will take about 10-15 minutes depending on your mixer.
2. Add half of the butter along with the vanilla and continue to knead until fully integrated.
3. Incorporatethe other half of the butter and knead again until fully integrated. You should have a perfectly developed dough.
4. Take the dough out of the bowl, round and put it in an airtight container, previously greased, until it grows 1/3 of its volume. In my case it took 3 and 1/2 hours at 70ºF/21ºC.
5. Store in the refrigerator until the next day, during the night the dough will almost triple its volume.

SECOND DAY

Prepare pastry cream.

1. In a medium saucepan pour the milk together with créme fraîche and vanilla. Place over medium heat and bring to a gentle boil.
2. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar and the previously sieved cornflour until completely homogenised.
3. Once the milk has come to the boil, pour some of it over the egg yolk mixture.
4. Whisk quickly to temper the yolks and prevent them from curdling into lumps.
5. Stir in the rest of the milk little by little, mixing very well each time.
6. Pour the mixture back into the pan and place over medium-low heat, stirring constantly. You will notice that the texture will gradually become thicker, but it will take a while. Patience.
7. Once at this point, remove from the heat.
8. While still hot, add the butter and mix with the whisk until homogeneous.
9. Pour into a tray/tupper/bowl (the larger the better because it will cool faster).
10. Cover with cling film to prevent it from setting and leave to cool completely.
11. Allow to cool completely before using. If desired, it can be made the day before and refrigerated until the next day.

Prepare butter square.

1. Prepare two Teflon sheets and place the butter cut into more or less equal pieces on one of them. Cover with the other sheet and flatten with a rolling pin.
2. You should give a square shape, or as far as possible, 20 cm on each side (or the width you have given to your dough).
3. It is very likely that the butter, after this process, has become warm and has a melting texture. Place the stretched butter with the Teflon sheets in the freezer until it has a firm but malleable consistency.
4. NOTE: If you use extra dry butter, it usually comes in slabs. Just adjust the size, and the desired amount, using a rolling pin to flatten it slightly.

Stretch the dough.

1. Take the dough out of the fridge and proceed to stretch it. You must work the dough directly from the cold, no need to temper it.
2. Lightly dust a work surface with flour and roll out the dough. Form a rectangle of approximately 32 x 20 cm.
3. Set aside.

Laminate.

1. Place the butter square in the center of the dough so that the width of the butter and the width of the dough are the same.
2. Fold the ends of the dough over the butter, bringing each of them to the center. Seal well the join of both folds in the central part, it is not necessary to seal the other two ends.

Stretch the dough and make the first single fold.

1. Lightly dust the work surface with flour and proceed to roll out the dough. Roll the dough in a single pass, from the center to the ends, and avoid insisting on the same place by rolling the dough over it.
2. As you roll out the dough, try to lift it from the work surface from time to time to make sure that it does not stick to the work surface (this could damage the pastry by causing it to break). If necessary, sprinkle with a little flour.
3. Stretch to approximately 40 x 20 cm.
4. With the help of a knife or pizza cutter, cut a thin thread from the two upper ends. In this way you equalize the dough.
5. Make the first fold, bring one of the ends to the center and repeat the same process with the other end placing it on top of the previous one. In the same way as if you were closing a triptych.
6. Gently roll the surface with a rolling pin to bring the folds together, if desired, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
7. NOTE: The dough scraps are not thrown away, you can keep them wrapped in film for 2 days (even freeze them) to add them to future doughs. For example Danish dough or puff pastry, bread, brioche... You can add between 20-25% of dough trimmings with respect to the total weight of flour in the recipe.

Second fold.

1. Lightly dust the work surface with flour and roll out the dough. Put pressure on it but do not overdo it.
2. Stretch again to the same length as last time, about 40 x 20 cm.
3. Cut the ends again and fold in the same way as the previous time.
4. Cover with film and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Third and last fold.

1. Repeat the same steps as for the second fold.
2. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Make the last stretch before shaping the mugis.

1. Lightly dust the work surface with flour and roll out the dough. Give the dough dimensions of approximately 30 x 15 cm.
2. As you stretch the dough, remember to occasionally lift the dough off the work surface to make sure it does not stick to the work surface and sprinkle a little flour if necessary.
3. Once you have the correct measurements, cut a strip from each side to even out the dough and leave the flaky layers "visible".
4. Divide the rectangle, on the narrower side, to obtain 9 strips of 1.5 cm wide.
5. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand for 30 minutes in the refrigerator.
6. NOTE: In the video you can see that the dough, when stretching the strips, shrinks trying to regain its shape. This is because the gluten is tense, a sign that it will be very difficult to form the buns. For this reason, you should let the dough rest so that the gluten relaxes and allows you to form the buns without resistance.

Shape mugis.

1. Take one of the strips, keeping the rest covered with film, and stretch it gently by sliding the strip of dough, on the sides that are not laminated, between your thumb and forefinger. You should achieve a length of approximately 50 cm.
2. Holding both ends of the strip of dough, roll it on the work surface as shown in the video. This way you will create a spiral look without damaging the dough laminate.
3. Shape into a heart shape.
4. Place on a perforated tray lined with silpat or Teflon, repeat the same process with the rest of the pieces.

Fill mugis with pastry cream and make final proof.

1. Put pastry cream in a piping bag with a 1 cm smooth nozzle and pour the cream to fill the holes. There is no dough under the cream, but after baking, the cream will be perfect and will stick to the baked dough, don't worry.
2. Spray mugis with water and cover with cling film to let them rise. To prevent the film from sticking to the pastry cream, place shot glasses in the center of the tray and sides, if necessary, and place the film over them, making sure the sides are covered.
3. Let rise until doubled in size. In my case they were 3 and 1/2 hours at 70ºF/21ºC.
   
   

Bake.

1. Preheat the oven to 365ºF/185ºC fan.
2. Beat an egg with a pinch of salt and brush. You should brush the mugis, avoiding always painting the layers or laminated part, you should only brush the areas where there is no laminate.
3. Bake for 13-14 minutes.
4. Remove, place on a cooling rack without removing from the Teflon or silpat (the cream will be hot and can separate) and let cool completely before brushing with pectin syrup.
5. NOTE: In my case, as I was very late, once they had cooled, I left on the cooling rack itself with the silpat or teflon and covered with film. I left them at room temperature until the next day.

Make pectin syrup.

1. Add  water to a saucepan and place over medium heat.
2. While it is heating, mix the sugar with the pectin.
3. When the water begins to be hot, but not boiling, add the sugar and pectin mixture, little by little, while stirring constantly with a whisk.
4. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until it comes to a boil.
5. At this point, remove from heat.
6. Add the lemon juice, mix and pour into a glass container.
7. Allow to cool completely before using.

Brush mugis.

1. Brush the buns with the pectin syrup, both the dough and the cream.
2. Let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes for the glaze to dry.
3. Serve.
   

Notes

• First important point: Pound cold butter, it will be easier to soft and reshape.
• Second important point: Work with a cold dough.
• Third important point: When you pound butter it turn soft but chill. It will be easily manageable.
• Fourth important point: Butter mustn´t be at room temperature or warm, because it will be absorbed by the dough rather than forming layers.
• If you don't have T45 flour, you can use instead: 250 g of high-strength flour W=380 + 50 g of soft pastry flour + 113 g of water (in this case more water must be added). You can also replace it with a high-strength flour W= 220-240.
• The final amount of water to be added to the dough will depend a little on the quality of the proteins in the dough or their absorption capacity. If necessary, we can add 5-10 g more water. The consistency of the dough should be very pleasant to the touch and easy to handle.
• For each gram of dry yeast we will use 3 g of fresh yeast.
• You can use natural vanilla or vanilla extract.
• I have used supermarket butter in this case, for that reason you can watch in the video that I sprinkle a little flour on the butter square. In other occasions I have used extra dry butter which gives very good results. This has a higher melting point than other varieties, so it will allow us to work better with it.
• To work the butter I prefer to do it between two sheets of Teflon, are reusable and is a very clean way of working. But use film or baking paper if you prefer.
• When handling the pieces, be careful not to press them, otherwise you can damage the layers that will lead to the future laminating.
• For this recipe I decided to make the custard I made for the Flan Pâtissier or Tortas Locas Malagueñas, but if you wish, you can make the traditional custard (recipe in this link). The cream I leave you with is softer in texture and much more delicate, but it also takes a little longer to be ready.
• On this occasion, for pastry cream, I have replaced the cream with créme fraîche. The result is wonderful. But if you can't find it, you can use whipping cream instead.
• Don't forget to temper the egg yolks to prevent them from curdling and forming lumps.
• Be patient when you are making the custard, it takes a little while to set and gain consistency. Don't be tempted to increase the heat as you run the risk of burning some of the base and transferring the flavour to the custard.
• If the pectin syrup gels too much, you can warm it in the microwave to lighten it.
• STORAGE: They are wonderful the same day we bake them, but surprisingly, the second and third day they are still amazing. I only lasted until the fourth day without eating one.... It was still very tender, a little less than the first days. I recommend storing them in an airtight container, they can be kept at room temperature because the cream is baked.
  

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• Pastry cream
• Vanilla