Buns with rhubarb and custard ⋆ MeCooks Blog

From childhood, I remember eating raw rhubarb stalks covered in sugar with great pleasure. Although rhubarb retained its characteristic, intensely sour taste even when covered in sugar, it tasted delicious. Rhubarb is a plant with a distinct, sour taste, used in both sweet and savoury dishes. Fresh rhubarb is in season once a year, in May, and it is then that various types of rhubarb cakes, buns, tarts and homemade compotes with this exceptional plant reign supreme on many tables.

I rarely eat rhubarb raw, but I love using it to make homemade baked goods. One of my favourite recipes is a bun with custard and rhubarb, which combines the sweetness of custard with the sourness of rhubarb, creating a dessert perfect for a May afternoon.

I start preparing these simple buns with a creamy filling by making a classic yeast dough. This fluffy dough is made from flour, yeast, sugar, eggs, lemon peel, butter and milk. After thoroughly mixing all the ingredients and carefully kneading, I leave the dough to rise in a warm place.

In the meantime, I sprinkle the rhubarb with sugar to release its juice, and then I cook the custard, which, when cooled, will become a creamy filling for the buns. When the dough has risen, I form small buns from it, I arrange the cooled custard and the cut rhubarb on top. I leave the whole thing to rise again for a while, then gently brush it with egg to obtain a golden crust and bake it until it has a beautiful, golden colour. These buns with custard and rhubarb are a great bake not only for breakfast or dinner, but also as a sweet snack during the day.

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Recipe for buns with rhubarb and custard — Buns with rhubarb and custard

Ingredients for buns with rhubarb and custard.

Dough:

500 g all-purpose flour
180 ml lukewarm milk
2 eggs
100 g melted butter
25 g fresh yeast
60 g powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon of grated lemon zest

Fruits:

2 tablespoons of crystal sugar
200 g rhubarb

Custard:

20 g plain pudding powder
250 ml milk
20 g crystal sugar

Additionally:

egg for brushing the buns

How to make buns with rhubarb and custard.

Put the crumbled yeast in a medium-sized bowl, pour in the lukewarm milk, then add 1 tablespoon of powdered sugar and 3 tablespoons of flour. Mix everything thoroughly for a while, so that there are as few lumps as possible in the yeast starter, and all the ingredients combine well. After mixing, set the bowl aside for about 10 minutes in a warm place, so that the yeast starts working and the starter can rise well.

Pour the powdered sugar into the bowl of a kitchen mixer, then add the eggs and grated lemon peel and beat everything for 4-5 minutes until you get a fluffy mass. Then pour in the flour, add the risen yeast and knead everything together for about a minute to combine the ingredients. Then, pour in the melted butter and continue kneading for another 10 minutes until you get an elastic and smooth yeast dough. Put the finished dough in a bowl, cover it with a clean kitchen towel and leave to rise for about 1.5 hours, until it doubles in volume.

Mix the rhubarb, cut into pieces, in a bowl with the crystal sugar. When ready, set aside for 1.5 hours.

In a pot, mix 150 ml of milk with crystal sugar. In a cup or bowl, combine the custard powder with the remaining milk. When the milk and sugar start boiling, pour in the liquid from the cup. Cook on low heat for 2 minutes, stirring very often. Cover the cooked custard with cling film and leave to cool.

Place the risen dough on the kitchen counter, lightly degas and divide it into 8 parts. Form each part into a ball, flatten them between your fingers and place them on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Make a hole in the middle of each cake with a glass, then fill them with pudding and rhubarb pieces. Leave the buns to rise for 25 minutes. Then brush them with egg and place in an oven preheated to 180 degrees Celsius for 26 minutes. Cool the baked buns on a metal rack.