Short, unnecessary story time:
In trying to save money and an hour-long round trip to Matsudo, I've been attempting to recreate my favorite burger shop's best seller. But the buns available at grocery stores have kept me FAR from capturing that feeling.
So I hit up ChatGPT. It basically said that the "good stuff" was hiding behind retail supply chains. Then it redirected me to GrahamBuns.com and I immediately spotted a couple products I recognized. One was a pink bun that a food truck that posts up at Chiba Jets games used to use. I also noticed buns used by Brisk Stand which has become a popular chain.
I ordered some buns that looked closest to my favorite shop's. The texture, chew and mouthfeel were an exact match. These are restaurant-grade. The only caveat: you have to order in bulk. I got the lowest amount allowed which was 16 buns, but that's okay since I have the freezer space and I'm still trying to hack the shop's jalapeno tartar sauce recipe which will take a few tries.
Pros:
- Selection is nuts – Pretzel buns will def be my next order
- Buns available in different sizes
- Made-to-order in Japan, frozen immediately after so you're getting max-fresh
- Simple ingredients like domestic flour. Also, they use 100% butter only, and I'm very anti-margarine/shortening so this is a huge plus
Cons:
- Bulk ordering only – Big up-front cost is no fun. I try to tell myself that the per-bun price is reasonable and they're frozen so they won't go bad so I save money in the long run. However, of course the more you order, the lower the per-bun cost.
- Since they're MTO and probably dealing mostly with business, it'll take about a week to arrive from the time you order.
- Uses Yamato cold shipping, so that's another not-so-tasty charge.
I used to only make burgers for lunch because the buns were just not to dinner standards for me (sounds ridiculous, I'm aware), but these get the job done.
Outside of these, oddly enough Lawson's burger buns were the only ones I found halfway decent.
by BrotakuzaTube