Guava Bread

My mother brought a sweet bread on her last visit, it was a large braided bread with pieces of guava paste in the middle, delicious! I took the recipe and made it in the shape of a ball with a guava filling and coconut topping. It was very good! This bread is made with lard, but if you don’t have it, you can make it with butter or margarine in the same quantity. Nowadays you can find lard in most supermarkets, it comes in the form of a “brick”, a really large rectangle and comes from several brands (Sadia, Aurora, Seara, Frimesa…).

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon dry yeast (granulated)
3/4 cup of warm milk
1 egg (to use in the dough)
1/4 cup melted lard
1/3 cup (tea) sugar
1 dessert spoon of salt
Flour until smooth.
* 1 egg yolk for brushing.

Add the milk, egg and melted lard. Mix well. Add the sugar, salt and yeast. Add flour little by little until you get a homogeneous dough that doesn’t stick to your hands. The amount of flour can vary, but is less than 1 kilo.

Let the dough rest for 40 minutes.
Make balls by placing a piece of guava paste in the center. Place the balls on a baking tray (no need to grease). Let it rise for another 30 minutes.

Mix a beaten egg yolk with 1 tablespoon of water. Brush over the breads.
Preheat the oven for 10 min. at 180ºC and bake. The time varies a lot from oven to oven, but in general, when they are very brown on top, they are done.

After the bread has cooled, heat 1/4 cup (tea) of water and 1/2 cup (tea) of sugar, do not stir to avoid sugar. Let it boil until tender (about 5 minutes on low heat). The sugar and water will mix completely and it will form a transparent and still thin syrup, that’s just how it is.
Brush the warm syrup over the bread and sprinkle with grated dry coconut.
*Yield: 10 loaves, slightly smaller than hamburger buns.