Giant Sticky Hot Cross Buns

It seems like hot cross buns are everywhere; in stores, in tweets, in blogs! In sticking with my current yeast facination I have chosen to make yeasted hot cross buns. I found this lovely recipe on iky200306's blog. Go check out her recipe, her hot cross buns look perfect!

The recipe said the dough should be shaped into 12 balls. Not being one to disregard direct instructions I made 12 balls. What did I get? 12 GIANT HOT CROSS BUNS! The buns turned out so giant that next time I will shape the dough into 24 balls. Those crosses of mine could also do with a bit more practice!

The end product went down well with all my beta testers ("Ten out of ten for the hot cross bunnies produced in tiny oven. :-D"). The only problem I had with these buns were photographing them! Anyone have ideas on how to dress up a hot cross bun? Next time I will experiment with a bit more mixed spice in the dough.

Hot Cross Buns
Makes 12-24

• 1kg Bread flour
  
• 10ml Salt
  
• 10g Instant yeast
  
• 80ml Sugar
  
• 5ml Ground cinnamon
  
• 15ml Mixed spice
  
• 60g Butter, melted
  
• 200ml Warm milk
  
• 375ml Warm water
  
• 1 Egg
  
• 250ml Raisin & sultana mix
  

Crosses

• 60ml Cake flour
  
• 15ml Oil
  
• Enough water to make a paste
  

Glaze

• 100ml Apricot jam
  
• 200ml Water
  
• 5ml Ground cinnamon
  
• 10ml Sugar
  

1. Mix all the dry ingredients except the raisins together.
   
2. Beat milk, butter and egg together, add to the dry ingredients.
   
3. Add water gradually until the dough is soft, not sticky. (water quantity is what I used, you may need more or less depending on your location and weather)
   
4. Knead dough for 3 minutes. Add raisins and knead further for 3 minutes.
   
5. Place dough in an oiled plastic bag, leave in a warm area to rise until doubled in size (about 40minutes).
   
6. Remove dough and knock it down. Shape the dough into balls and place into a well greased dish. (12 balls were too large for me, 16-20 is probably better). Cover and leave to rise for 20 minutes.
   
7. Mix ingredients for the crosses. Pipe on to the dough just before baking.
   
8. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees Celcius for 30 minutes or until the buns are golden brown.
   
9. Boil ingredients for the glaze together until it reaches the consistency of syrup.
   
10. While the buns are cooling, brush the tops with the glaze. Glaze the tops another 2 times before digging in!
    

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