Polynesian Sweet Bread {Bread Machine Recipe} (2024)

FAQs

Why does Hawaiian bread taste sweet? ›

Based off of Portuguese sweet bread (Pao Doce), Hawaiian sweet bread recipes call for lots of sugar, up to 1.5 cups per batch in some recipes. Since it's a fortified dough, you'll also find butter and milk or condensed milk in the recipe. Those ingredients make the bread rich and sweet.

But in general, people no longer refer to them as Portuguese sweet bread. Instead, most now simply refer to them as sweet bread. Some enterprising companies even refer to them as Hawaiian sweet bread. But make no mistake, the latest generation of sweet breads in Hawaii owe their existence to Portuguese immigrants.

Adding Ingredients to the Bread Machine

Manufacturers usually recommend adding the liquids first, followed by dry ingredients, with the yeast going in last. This keeps the yeast away from the liquid ingredients until kneading begins.

Too much heat or humidity might lead to a too-quick rise and a crevice near the center of your bread. Conditions that are too cold might delay proofing or rising, resulting in a super-dense loaf.

But like many popular Hawaiian foods, they weren't exactly native. Sweetened breads came to the islands with the Portuguese immigrants who flooded Hawaii in the mid-to-late 19th century to work the livestock ranches and sugarcane plantations.

Additionally, when dough is fermented slower, the complex starches and sugars can ferment fully. These fermented sugars create an alcohol-based ingredient known as maltose, which works to make the bread taste sweeter while also deepening the aroma.

“That's a tradition from the old country,” Goretti said. Goretti was referring to her native country of Portugal, where it is customary to eat sweet bread with a hard-boiled egg baked into its center on Easter Sunday. The egg symbolizes new life and the resurrection of Christ.

Brioche leans heavily on the added heft of eggs and butter, whereas Hawaiian bread embraces extra sweeteners like sugar, honey, or even pineapple juice, as well as a smaller quantity of eggs and dairy.

Sweetbreads are a part of traditional French cuisine. In Henri-Paul Pellaprat's classic Modern French Culinary Art, which was published in English in 1966, he includes six different recipes for sweetbreads, including versions with cream sauce, with ham, presented in pastry cases, and à la Florentine.

Making bread from a machine is marginally cheaper than buying it, as long as you eat bread frequently enough to offset the cost of the appliance. Specifically, I see this as an investment that's smart for households that go through bread quickly, like large families or homes with multiple roommates.

What is the best flour for bread machines? ›

Just be sure to use a flour with a high protein content. King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour, with its high gluten, is an excellent flour for bread machines. Numerous people have told us that their recipes worked in the bread machine using King Arthur, when they didn't work with other all-purpose flours.

Some instructions tell you to put wet ingredients in first, followed by dry ingredients. Others suggest you put the flour in, followed by salt and sugar, then wet ingredients, and finally the yeast. Almost all recipes will suggest you add the yeast last, otherwise, the dough won't rise quite as well.

Some attribute the demise of the bread machine to the fact that cooks were just disappointed by their results. Lara Pizzorno, the author of Bread Machine Baking, chalked it up to food snobs who regarded the machine as “the electric equivalent of The Bridges of Madison County” in a 1996 article in The New York Times.

Condensation can build up in a bread machine if it is not opened at the end of the baking program. If a loaf is left in the machine after baking it can absorb the moisture from the condensation and become soggy. For future bakes, remove the loaf at the end of the baking cycle.

The recipe you're using may include too much yeast, or the machine may be proofing the bread at too high a temperature, causing the loaf to be over-proofed before the baking cycle begins. Try reducing the amount of yeast by half and see what happens.

King's Hawaiian rolls are a very sweet, soft bread that is sweetened and flavored with pineapple juice (hence the name Hawaiian) and added sugars.

The taste is only a slight hint of sweetness. The texture is amazing, so soft and doughy.

Hawaiian rolls contains 90 calories per 29 g serving. This serving contains 1.5 g of fat, 3 g of protein and 18 g of carbohydrate. The latter is 5 g sugar and 1 g of dietary fiber, the rest is complex carbohydrate.

Hawaiian bread is different from regular bread in that it is slightly sweet and has a soft, tender texture.