Tuesday 26 March 2013

Easter Baking - Hot Cross Buns #cbias


Easter baking - hot cross buns



Although the weather is making it feel more like Christmas, believe or not Easter will be here in just a few days time. To make it feel a bit more like the Easter holidays I decided to do some baking. As you may know I have been trying to challenge myself with recipes recently, experimenting with things I've never tried before, so off I went to Aldi in search of the ingredients for a yummy Easter treat that I was going to bake myself....

                                                                   hot cross buns!

You can check out my shopping experience in this Google+ album...

Shopping for Easter baking Ingredients at Aldi

I love a nice toasted hot cross bun, warm and dripping with butter, it really is the perfect comfort food and what better to warm us all up in this nasty cold weather?

My 5 year old Ben is a really keen cook and usually helps me with baking but on this occasion I wanted to try it out myself first so I waited until the children were tucked up in bed then out came the ingredients...

Can you spot the error in this picture?!

I was really pleased with what I had got for my money in Aldi, as although I regularly visit for a top up shop of fruit, veg, bread and milk, it's not the first place I would have gone for home baking ingredients. Well now I know about the great selection and prices it will be in the future!


So I had my ingredients ready all I needed to do was start baking. After mixing the flour, salt, cinnamon and mixed spice together in a large bowl, I rubbed in the butter then added the currents, mixed peel and yeast.

I now had a dry lumpy mixture and created a well in the centre to add the water, milk and egg, (this is always Ben's favourite part of baking, adding eggs!)

After mixing in, I was ready to knead. There is something incredibly relaxing about kneading dough, maybe I am taking all my daily frustrations out on this fruity mixture, while I pound it against the floury surface, whatever it is, I find it really therapeutic!



Once it's fairly smooth and elastic I pop it back into the bowl and cover with a damp tea towel for an hour while I go off to watch Don't tell the Bride, it's my wedding anniversary this week and it all takes me back to the preparations for my big day, thank goodness I planned it and not my other half though, I'd have been wearing a bin bag if it was down to him!

After a  giggle and a brew it was back to the kitchen to find my dough had risen nicely, now to press the air out and knead again before dividing up into buns and leaving again for 30 minutes to continue to rise.


I have always wondered how the cross was made on the top of hot cross buns and now I knew, it was pastry! Rather than making my own pastry just for this, I had bought a pack of ready to roll with my earlier shopping, so I opening this up and started cutting it into strips, I barely glanced at the packaging.

It was soon time to pop the buns in the oven, so after brushing with beaten egg and placing the strips of pastry on top of each ball of dough in they went at 200c for 15 minutes.



It was only when I went to take them out of the oven that I noticed that something wasn't right, not wrong as such, they still looked (and smelt) delicious, but I was sure the cross wasn't meant to rise that much? It was only then that I glanced across to the packaging of the pastry to find I had bought Puff Pastry and not shortcrust! Silly me! (Did you notice my error in the photo?)

Oh well, they still tasted amazing (I had to try one straight away, just to make sure!) and I now know for next time, Although my hubby did say that he quite liked the crunchiness of the puff pastry so you never know I could be on to something!

Apart from my school girl error, these were a great success and I will be making them again with Ben's help very soon. Why not have a go and let me know what you think? 



Happy Easter!


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9 comments:

  1. They look yummy. Will have to try!

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    1. They really are! Let me know how they turn out if you do! x

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  2. They look very tasty!! I'll be having a go at the weekend :)

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  3. I did wonder when I saw the pastry in the top photo! If you don't have anything to do with the rest, spread it with a mix of butter, cinnamon and sugar and re-roll it up, chop into 1cm rolls and bake. Delicious warm... :)

    Puff pastry or not your Hot Cross Buns look far nicer than mine - we have rock buns I think!

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  4. Love hot cross buns they look great! I now want to go stuff my face with hot cross buns!

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  5. They look so tasty, makes me want some now :)

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  6. I adore Hot Cross Buns, especially when laden with Provencal Lavender Honey. So delicious and healthy

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