Japanese Milk Bread!!!

I have been craving shokupan or Japanese milk bread for a while now, but there isn't really a bakery here in Richmond that I know of that sells the bread so I've been looking for a recipe.  What makes the bread so good is the texture!  It isn't crusty like European breads, but soft, fluffy and slightly chewy.  The first time I had Japanese milk bread was in Los Angeles and I've been craving the stuff ever since. Well, thanks to the internet and others who find the bread pretty tasty, I have found a recipe!  I was so excited.

For the recipe, check out this site: Tasty Kitchen: A Happy Recipe Community. The recipe calls for "flour" but doesn't indicate whether to use all-purpose or bread.  I used all-purpose flour and it was fine.  The bread came out fairly dense (no air bubbles as in European breads), soft and chewy.  I will use bread flour next time to see if it makes much difference.  It also calls for "dry yeast", which I didn't have.  I only had active dry yeast and the bread turned out fine.  I highly recommend using full fat milk and if you can find it, full fat dry milk.  In the recipe, you are supposed to incorporate 2 Tablespoons of softened butter. In my late night baking, I forgot to add the butter according to the recipe.  I had already mixed all of the dry and wet ingredients and was forming a dough ball when I realized I hadn't added the butter.  I ended up kneading in the butter. Well, it turned out that adding the butter later allowed the dough to come together better.  The end dough ball was smooth, soft and not sticky at all!
This bread is delicious!  It is amazing when it's fresh and hot out of the oven with tons of butter! It's also good toasted with butter and your favorite jam with a good cup of tea. :-)

My breakfast

I think my next step is to buy a pullman pan.  Ahhhh... square bread, just like in Los Angeles. :-)