Bolo bao—the pineapple bun—was always the first thing I grabbed. Every Sunday of my childhood in Los Angeles, I’d gravitate to this Chinese bakery staple, with its soft, light, and feathery interior and it’s crumbly-sweet cookie crust. The pineapple bun earned its name thanks to its bright yellow glow—the result of an egg-yolk wash that gives the scored exterior a resemblance to the outside of a pineapple. (There’s not actually any pineapple involved.) I’d convince my parents to buy five or more, so I could stash them in the freezer and eat them every day until we came back the following weekend. I loved—and still love—eating a bolo bao for breakfast with a hot cup of Hong Kong milk tea.
The Mexican bakeries I went to as a kid seemed to have their own version of a bolo bao: the concha. I found it trippy that two geographically distant cultures created baked goods that had so much in common. The concha, scored with gradient lines, was also named after its resemblance to something that definitely does not appear within: in this case, a seashell. The conchas I loved were a bit crunchier on top, a bit denser within, and were usually enjoyed with a cup of coffee or hot chocolate. They came in vanilla and chocolate, but a rainbow of other colors too.
As a young teen I made my first trip to Japan, where I found yet another iteration of a sweet bun with a crunchy cookie top: melon pan, named for its resemblance to the exterior of a cantaloupe melon. I’d say that the melon pan falls somewhere in between a concha and a bolo bao. The texture of the enriched dough is sturdier than what you find with a pineapple bun, but softer and sweeter than a concha, and the cookie top is usually more solid and cookie-like than both its counterparts. Melon pan is sometimes scored in a crosshatch design, or it’s not scored, but through baking it separates a bit, yielding a crackly pattern that brings to mind the appearance of the peel of a cantaloupe. Melon pan are also frequently made into fun shapes like turtles or bears. (I can’t resist a baked good that looks like a turtle; I’d take any excuse to eat or make one.)
Even if you don’t make them into turtle shapes, melon pan are still fun.
