Sunday Dinner: Sweet Red Bean Buns

I am very aware of the fact that it is Monday morning. I had a Psychology report to finish up last night, so that was at the top of my priorities list. I'm just taking a quick break (while letting my hair dry) before scuttling off to campus to turn it in and meet with my Psychology poster group (yes, they're still making us do posters). But on to this week's Sunday Dinner.

The dish for this week is Steamed Sweet Red Bean Buns. These are something that I have had since I was young, but never homemade.

Red Bean Buns

I was recently introduced to an Asian store that's very near the flat. I think the expression, "like a kid in a candy store", applies aptly to this situation. I was running around looking sushi nori and mochi and rice crackers and lots of frozen goodies. I even went a little overboard and bought a wok and steaming baskets. What you have to understand is even though I'm as white as a snowflake, my childhood food memories include Indian curries, pad Thai, sushi, and other such ethic foods you would expect a child of three to turn their nose up to. I don't actually ever remember stepping foot into a TGI Fridays or Applebee's until I started to drive and go out with friends who wanted to go to such places (and let me tell you, I was not impressed).

My dad travelled a lot when I was a kid so he and my mom almost made sure that their kids would turn their noses up to places like TGI Fridays and Applebee's. Not to mention the fact that two of my childhood friends were Japanese. And when I have attended a few youth Buddhist meetings back home I had a few Japanese ladies comment on my skinniness and shove two or three rice balls into my hands.

Anyway, I got the recipe from a very cool blog which is linked here. It's a very fun blog and I'm sure I'll probably try more recipes from here in the future.

Making these buns were really fun. I've always enjoyed making bread (it's a good stress reliever) and getting to attempt to crease the dough and form them into a bun was a real challenge, but a fun one. However, I don't think that I'll use the canned red (azuki) bean paste anymore. The stuff I got from the shop was not at all good so I'm finding it difficult to scarf down all of them. Next time I make them I'll probably make the paste myself (which may end up on Sunday Dinner in the future). I'll probably also make the buns a little smaller so they fit in my medium baskets better...and because the ones I have now are pretty darn big.

That's all for Sunday Dinner this week. If you have any recipes you'd like me to try please post them as a comment. I'll eventually get around to making any recipe that is given to me and put them all on Sunday Dinner.