June 12th is Philippine Independence Day! To celebrate, we’re sharing our vegan ensaymada recipe. This is a plant-based version of a popular Filipino sweet bread. Ensaymada are typically eaten for breakfast or as a snack in the Philippines, but they also make a wonderful dessert. Don’t be put off by the use of grated cheddar cheese in this recipe. It may seem strange, but the creamy salty addition of the cheddar cheese makes these rolls very special and unique.
The cheese is usually added as a topping, but we decided to put our own spin on the traditional recipe and use the cheese as a filling for our vegan ensaymada. We also chose to give them a shape that is a little more fun than what you would typically find for ensaymada. And the topping in this recipe is more of a sugary butter rather than a standard buttercream. The end result is a delicious little roll that honors the traditional ensaymada while creating something interesting and delightful.
We really love using the tangzhong method for creating incredibly soft breads. This method is particularly satisfying for dessert breads. If you like this vegan ensaymada recipe, we also use the tangzhong method in the recipe for our vegan pandesal, another Filipino bread.
Make sure to check out the recipe notes for additional information and tips.
If you try this recipe, leave us a comment below to let us know how it goes. We would love to hear from you!
Vegan Ensaymadas
Equipment
- stand mixer
- sheet tray
Ingredients
Tangzhong
- 16 g all-purpose flour
- 75 g unsweetened soy milk
Dough
- 1 tsp active dry yeast
- 50 g unsweetened soy milk
- 30 g Just Egg
- 30 g sugar
- 18 g vegan butter
- 200 g all-purpose flour
- ½ tsp kosher salt
Filling
- 25 g sugar
- 75 g vegan cheddar cheese grated
Topping
- 90 g vegan butter softened
- 45 g sugar
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
Dough
- In a small saucepan, whisk together the flour and soy milk for the tangzhong until no more dry flour remains. The mixture will be lumpy, but that's fine. Turn on heat to medium, and whisk constantly while cooking. Turn off the heat as soon as the mixture becomes a thick paste. This should only take a couple minutes. This is the tangzhong.
- Into a stand mixer bowl, add the soy milk, sugar, Just Egg, and yeast. Use a spatula or whisk to mix until well-combined. Add the butter, flour, tangzhong, and kosher salt. Mix until a shaggy dough forms.
- Place the bowl on the stand mixer and attach the dough hook. Mix on medium until the dough is soft and supple, about 5 minutes.
- Lightly oil a large bowl with about 1 tsp of vegetable oil. Turn off the stand mixer. Form the dough into a ball, and transfer it to the oiled bowl. Use your hands to spread some oil across the entire surface of the dough.
- Cover the bowl and let rise until doubled in size (about 1 hour).
Shaping
- Line a baking sheet tray with a silicone mat or parchment paper.
- Punch down the dough. Turn the dough out onto a clean work surface (the dough should be oily enough to not need to flour the surface). Stretch or roll out the dough into a rectangle measuring about 12" x 18".
- Sprinkle about half of the sugar onto the center third of the dough, followed by about half of the grated cheddar cheese.
- Fold over one side of the dough to cover the sugar and cheese.
- Sprinkle the remaining sugar and grated cheedar cheese on top of the folded over dough.
- Fold over the last third of the dough to cover the sugar and cheese.
- Cut the dough into 6 equal pieces.
- With each piece, make 2 long cuts along the length of the dough to divide the piece into 3 equal strands, leaving the strands connected at one end.
- Braid the strands using the typical braiding method.
- Starting at the connected end of the strands, roll along the length of the strands to form a ball. If any cheese has fallen out, you can just place the pieces on the surface of the dough ball.
- Place the dough balls on the lined baking sheet tray. Loosely cover the sheet tray and let the dough rise until about puffy (about 1 hour).
Bake and Topping
- Use a spoon to mix together the softened butter, sugar, and vailla extract for the topping. Place in the fridge until ready to use.
- Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
- Once the ensaymada have risen, uncover the sheet tray and bake in the center of the oven until the tops of the rolls are golden brown, about 20-25 minutes.
- Once the rolls are completely cooled, spread the vanilla sugar butter topping on the top of each roll.
Notes
- Like many of our recipes, this recipe uses Just Egg as an egg replacer. We have not tried this recipe with any other egg substitutes. If you do, please let us know how it turns out!
- Our butter of choice for baking is Earth Balance Buttery Sticks.
- The grated cheddar cheese we used for this recipe is Violife Cheddar Shreds.
Wow, these look amazing!