Hot Cross Buns

Well Good Friday has come around and how quickly does this seem since I last posted what was incoming for April on Looks Good Lets Eat.

Now to start this Easter weekend could come a variety of options, start eating copious amounts of chocolate; already on it and still feeling good or start baking with the kids, one of my favourite past times.

Baking it is, with intermittent stops for chocolate and we have decided to make a favourite during this period, Hot Cross Buns. The recipe is one I had gotten off BBC Good Food website and adapted slightly as you do after reading the comments. The recipe is by the TV baker Paul Hollywood and I will admit I do like his recipes and he provides some seriously good bread recipes so had faith in this one. The only adaption I made to this recipe was adding more spice to the mix and using a bread maker for the first part of the recipe as seen in the tips section of the recipe.

After what seems a lifetime to a kid, these tasty treats went down a storm once cooked as we had them as a snack this afternoon luxuriously topped with butter. They are that good we are also having them for breakfast tomorrow morning, that’s if Mum and I don’t eat them all.

Hope you all enjoy this recipe too and Happy Easter.

Hot Cross Buns

Light and fluffy Hot Cross Buns for Easter.

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Prep Time 30 mins

Cook Time 15 mins

Total Time 46 mins

Servings 12 buns

Ingredients

  

For the bun

• 300 ml full-fat milk plus 2 tbsp. more
• 50 g Butter
• 500 g strong bread flour
• 1 tsp. Salt
• 75 g caster sugar
• 75 g sultanas
• 50 g mixed peel
• 1 apple peeled, cored and finely chopped
• 1 orange zest
• 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp. mixed spice
• 7 g fast-action or easy-blend yeast
• 1 egg beaten

For the cross

• 75 g Plain Flour plus extra for dusting

For the glaze

• 3 tbsp. runny hunny

Instructions

 

• Bring the milk to the boil, then remove from the heat and add the butter. Leave to cool until it reaches hand temperature. Put the flour, salt, sugar, fruit, zest, spices and yeast into your bread maker. Pour in the warm milk and butter mixture, and then add the egg. Turn your machine on to dough and allow it to do its magic. This took an hour and a half for my machine.
• Divide the dough into 12 even pieces. Roll each piece into a smooth ball on a lightly floured work surface. Arrange the buns on one or two baking trays lightly greased and dusted with flour, leaving enough space for the dough to expand. Cover (but don’t wrap) with more oiled cling film, or a clean tea towel, then set aside to prove for 1 hour more.
• Heat oven to 220C/200C fan/gas 7. Mix the flour with about 5 tbsp. water to make the paste for the cross – add the water 1 tbsp. at a time, so you add just enough for a thick paste. Spoon into a piping bag with a small nozzle. Pipe a line along each row of buns, then repeat in the other direction to create crosses. Bake for 20 minutes on the middle shelf of the oven, until golden brown.
• Gently squeeze over some of the runny hunny and use a pastry brush to brush it over all of your hot cross buns.