the viral ube pan de sal with a melty cheesecake center recipe by Kat Lieu

this recipe was developed from descriptions by my neighbor who ate a box of Valerio's ube pan de sal in Hawaii <3

scroll down for the recipe

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reflection

dear friend,

my neighbor Kelley told me about Valerio’s Hawaii (Home of the Famous “Toto's Special Ube Cheese Pandesal” and my mouth watered. She told me the top was crispy and sweet, like cookie crumbs, the outside was crispy, and the inside was soft with melty white cheese which I assumed was cream cheese. Overall, the ube pan de sal was sweet.

So, of course, I couldn’t sleep after hearing Kelley’s descriptions and knew I had to make ube pan de sal at home. After all, I had all the ingredients ready in my pantry.

Pan de sal is known as “salt bread” of a Filipino dinner roll, and it’s not supposed to be tall and fluffy like milk bread rolls. The outside should be a bit crispy, thanks to a generous rolling in bread crumbs. Like any good dinner roll, the inside should still be soft, a ready and willing vessel for butter and a melty cheesecake filling like here.

All things happen for a reason, and all things are connected. As a Tasting Table columnist, I recently wrote about bánh mì, another baked goodie with origins deeply rooted in colonization and racism (French colonization of Vietnam versus Spanish colonization of the Phillippines). To make bánh mì crispy, you need to steam the bread in the oven and spray it at least three times with water the baking process.

So that’s one thing I did when I baked my ube pan de sal: sprayed the bread and placed a water bowl in the lower rack in the oven. This way, I steam the pan de sal while it’s baking. The inside remains airy, soft, and tender, without tangzhong or yudane in the dough, and the outside is crispy and crackles.

I made 12 buns and they went down quick. Even my Filipino husband, who often tells me my Filipino dishes need some work, thought this was legitly the best pandesal he’s ever eaten… (He was born and raised in Bacolod, FYI.) WOOOT!

See my video for reference:

katlieu

A post shared by @katlieu

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Order a copy of my cookbook today or leave a review, please!

Cookbook 2, MODERN ASIAN KITCHEN, is coming 2024; stay tuned for more info! (You can already find it online for preordering but I’m not officially announcing it until late September!)

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Kat’s summer playlist for cooking and baking:

https://music.apple.com/us/playlist/kl-cookbook-2-playlist-3/pl.u-Gegf89l9P6

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RECIPE

Ingredients