Ni Su Mien Bao (Milk Crispy Bread)

My in-laws are in town for the weekend so we wanted to make something special for them for breakfast. We chose this recipe which comes from Taiwan. It looks and tastes great and is very easy to make. My friend Chwen-Li taught me how to make Ni Su Mien Bao during one of our many study breaks in graduate school.

Breads like this are apparently common in Taiwan. Ni Su Mien Bao is an extremely versatile recipe and you can substitute your own favorite fillings and toppings and achieve great results. Here's how you do it.

Ingredients:
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter, cut into pads
1/2 cup milk powder
2 loaves of frozen white bread dough
3/4 cup raisins
1 egg
almonds, shaved or walnuts, crushed

Preparation:

1. Thaw 2 loaves of the bread dough in the refrigerator over night. This is how a loaf will look when thawed:
   
2. Mix sugar, butter, and milk powder in a bowl using a wooden spoon. Continue mixing until the pads of butter are broken up into small pieces.
3. Preheat oven to 180 degrees fahrenheit.
4. Cut each loaf of dough into 3 equal sized, long pieces. These will eventually be used to form a braid and form the shape of the bread.
   
   
5. Flatten each of the long pieces by hand or you can use a rolling pin.
   
6. Make a small mound of the sugar, butter, milk powder mixture along the length of the strips of dough.
   
7. Sprinkle raisins along the length of each strip of dough.
   
8. Enclose the powder and raisins within the dough by pulling the edges of the dough together.
   
   
   
9. After the filling has been added to each strip of dough, braid 3 strips together to form a loaf of bread.
   
10. Place on a greased baking pan.
11. Brush the top of the bread with egg yolk and sprinkle crushed walnuts or shaved almonds on top. The yolk will adhere the nuts to the top of the bread and also give the bread a glazed, golden brown presentation.
    
    
12. Bake for 30 minutes at 180 degrees fahrenheit.
13. Bake the Ni Su Mien Bao at 350 degrees fahrenheit for am additional 15 minutes.
    
14. The finished product.
    

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Taiwan