Ingredients
To activate the yeast: (skip this step if you use instant yeast)
3 Tbsp warm water
1 ½ tsp active dry yeast
1 tsp sugar
Dough:
230 gr bread flour
30 gr sugar
3 gr salt
100 ml whole milk + 3 Tbsp if using instant yeast
40 gr softened butter
Instructions
Activate the yeast (for active dry yeast):
If you use instant yeast, you can skip this step. Place the yeast, warm water (make sure it’s comfortably warm so it doesn’t kill the yeast),and sugar in a bowl. Let it sits for 10 minutes to dissolve the yeast. It will turn foamy
Make the dough:
Place all the ingredients for the dough in a mixing bowl of a stand mixer. Use a dough hook attachment and knead the dough at speed 2 until you get a rough dough, about 5 minutes. Add the softened butter, one pat at a time
The dough will turn into a sticky mess. Do not add any flour. Once all the butter is in, increase to speed 4 and keep kneading until the butter gets absorbs by the dough, it may take somewhere from 10-15 minutes or so. You may need to stop the machine halfway and scrape the side of the bowl several times. The dough should be soft, stretchy, shiny and just slightly sticky to the touch. If you gently and slowly stretch the dough thinly, it won’t break. This is what we call a window pane stage.
1st proofing:
Cover and let the dough proof at a warm place. I use the oven’s bread proof function and let it rises until double in size. It may tak 1 to 1 1/2 hours depending on the temperature
Shape the dough:
Update: I no longer recommend baking directly on the air-fryer basket. It works on some air fryers and it doesn’t work on others. This used to work well on my old air-fryer, but my new air-fryer just won’t do it! The bottom of the buns is undercooked while the top is already overbaked. I bake in a round cake pan that will fit in my air fryer and it consistently give me good result
Once the dough is proofed, punch the air out and knead a few times. Divide the dough into 24 smaller doughs, about 25-30 grams each dough. I feel that this size of rolls bake more evenly in my air fryer.
If you have a large capacity in your air-fryer, say it can fit in 7 or 8 inch round cake pan, you can try using that and fit about 10-12 rolls per pan. Just monitor the cooking time
Work with one dough at a time while keeping the rest covered. Flatten and fold towards the center to form a round tight dough ball
This recipe will make 3 batches of 8 buns each, using 6-inch round cake pan. It’s the best size to use as it cooks the buns more evenly in my air fryer. The larger the pan you use, the harder for the dough to cook evenly in the air fryer. Arrange one dough in the middle and 7 others around it with some gap in between
You have 16 other small doughs. If you only have one pan, you can arrange the dough on an oversize parchment paper, larger than the 6-inch round pan so you can lift the paper up and put it inside the pan later. So, you will bake in a total of 3 different batches. I know it’s a bit of a hassle, but it yields better result this way
2nd proofing:
Let the dough proof again at a warm place until puffy and doubles in size again, about 40 minutes to one hour or longer, depending on the temperature
Air-baked the dough:
Preheat the air-fryer at 320 F (160 C) for 5 minutes. Place the cake pan in and bake for 5 minutes and then check on it. If the top started to brown, you can tent loosely with aluminum foil (if the foil won’t fly around inside, it used to do that on my old air fryer but not the new one). If the aluminum foil might fly around because of the fan on top, you can cover the pan with the foil tightly (this increases the baking time). I baked mine for a total of 20 minutes. Update: Just got a new air fryer and it only took 12 minutes total baking time (yup, quite a big difference) The baking temperature and time are just for reference. You may have to experiment with your air fryer as it may turn out very differently depending on the brand and size of your air fryer. I would say the cooking time can range from 10-15 minutes at 320 F (160 C)
Continue baking the next batch
You can bake this in the oven too. Bake in a preheated oven at 350 F (180 C) for 13-15 minutes.
Cool down:
Brush with some butter on top while the buns are still warm. Remove the buns from the pan and let them cool down completely on a cooling rack
Storage:
Once they have cooled down completely, wrap them with a cling wrap and put in air-tight bag or container. They should stay soft for 2-3 days at room temperature
