Panda Bread

This was floating around on Pinterest a while ago and it got stuck in my brain, so while doing my laundry today and having to wait around for the washing machine to do its thing I thought I'd have a go at it. 

I did a bit of googling and found what has been credited as the original post from TaroTaro ( http://cookpad.com/recipe/349795 ) but it's in Japanese and I wasn't going to get anywhere with the auto-translation.  So another try found a blog called "Do What I Like" by Florence ( http://wlteef.blogspot.co.uk/2007_10_01_archive.html#!/2007/10/panda-bread.html ) who translated it into English otherwise I wouldn't have tried, thank-you Florence!  She also points out that October 15th is world bread day, which I think should be a holiday observed by all.

It was a lot easier to assemble than I thought, and a bit more fun, I almost wish it had taken longer to do but longer would have meant frustration so maybe it's better that it was fast.  I didn't have green tea powder so I used food colouring, I never thought something could be both lurid and pastel at the same time.

It split while baking where I had the wrinkle that I couldn't smooth out in the outer layer, I'm also thinking Taro has a special bread tin with a lid or something that lets her get a flat top on the loaf, but I'm still proud of effort. 

For a first attempt, I think it's sufficiently comical!

If you go to Taro's website she has a collection of pictures from over a hundred people who have tried and their sometimes hilarious results!