Sweet Coconut Bun

My 75th recipe "Sweet Coconut Bun", Platinum Jubilee celebration post. It looks like I just started off with my first post, but time has gone by so quickly and today I am posting my 75th recipe. A great feeling. To show my happiness, I was thinking to prepare a special dish for today's post. When RK said that today is Mardi Gras, it was an added reason for me to make something sweet 😀

I do not have much of an idea about Mardi Gras. All I have seen are the colorful masks and costumes at the malls around this time. When, RK heard somewhere that King Cake is made on Mardi Gras day, he started insisting me to prepare and post it today. But after making the red velvet cake just 2 days back, I was in no mood to prepare another cake. I wanted to expand my horizon and try something different. Something which is special, baked, sweet and at the same time colorful as a Mardi Gras Carnival.

And when, I saw the tutti fruit and coconut sitting in my refrigerator, I immediately knew what to make. Taking inspiration from the dish "Dil Pasand" I have tasted in India, I made this cute little coconut bun with a super delicious filling. A lovely dish which resonates with the colors of Mardi Gras and a worthy candidate for the Platinum Jubilee celebration 🙂

Sweet Coconut Bun

Sweet Coconut Bun

Revathi Palani

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Prep Time 1 hour hr 30 minutes mins

Cook Time 25 minutes mins

Total Time 1 hour hr 55 minutes mins

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine Indian

Servings 5

Ingredients

  

For Dough

• All purpose flour - 1 ½ Cup
• Milk / Water - ¼ Cup To activate yeast
• Sugar - 3 Tbsp
• Active Dry Yeast - ¾ Tbsp
• Water - ¼ Cup Adjust as needed
• Salt - ¾ tsp
• Olive oil - 3 Tbsp

For Stuffing

• Ghee / Oil - 1 tsp
• Cashew - 10 roughly chopped
• Raisin - 20
• Grated coconut - 1 ½ Cup
• Sugar - ¼ Cup
• Cardomom powder - ¼ tsp
• Tutti frutti - ½ Cup

Instructions

 

• First we will start with the dough preparation. Warm the milk and add 1 Tbsp of sugar to it and completely dissolve the sugar. Now add the yeast to the milk and dissolve the yeast and keep aside. Now take the flour in a large mixing bowl, add the water, 2 Tbsp sugar, salt, olive oil and the prepared yeast-milk.
  
   
• Now mix them together to form a smooth dough. Sprinkle additional water incase the dough is too stiff. Cover the dough with plastic cling wrap and let it to rest in a warm place for 1 hour.
  
   
• Mean while we will start with the stuffing preparation. Heat a pan with ghee, add the cashews and raisins. Once the raisin puffs-up, add the grated coconut and saute for 1-2 minutes.
  
   
  
   
• Turn off the flame and let the mixture cool down for 10 minutes. After cooling, add the Cardomom powder, sugar and tutti frutti and mix thoroughly. Stuffing is now ready.
  
   
• By now, the rested dough would have increased in size. Again knead the dough slightly. Line a baking sheet with aluminium foil and grease it with olive oil. Now divide the dough into five equal parts and make them into balls and place them in greased sheet with good amount of spacing in between the balls. Grease the dough balls with olive oil, cover with a plastic cling wrap and let them rest for another 10 minutes. After resting, the balls would have again increased in size.
  
   
• Now flatten the balls with the help of your finger into rough circle shape as shown in pic and place a scoop full of stuffing at its center and gather its corner to form a pouch. Seal them together and roll in between your palms to form a ball again and place them on the baking sheet. Repeat the same with other dough balls.
  
   
  
     

  
   
  
   
• Grease the top of the bun with olive oil or ghee and arrange them on the greased baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 350 F and bake the buns for about 20 - 25 minutes, until the bun color changes to golden brown.
  
   
• Decorate with tutti frutti and enjoy warm.
  
  

Notes | FAQ

- Milk to dissolve yeast should be warm. If it is hot, it will kill the yeast. If it is cold, the yeast might not activate.

- Dough should be soft and smooth, so adjust the water quantity accordingly.

- After the resting time the dough should have raised in quantity, if not then your yeast is not active.

- Greasing the top of the bun with olive oil gives a nice golden brown color to the bun.

- Do not add the sugar to the stuffing while it is hot. Let the stuffing get cooled for 10 minutes before adding the sugar.

- If you can't find Tutti frutti, you can replace with your favorite combination of other dry fruits. For folks who don't know, Tutti frutti (from Italian "all fruits", also hyphenated tutti-frutti) is a colorful confection containing various chopped and usually candied fruits, or an artificially created flavoring simulating the combined flavor of many different fruits. It is often used for making a tutti frutti ice cream flavor.