A Weekend of Baking...Hot Cross Buns

A particular favourite of mine at this time of year, I decided to make my own hot cross buns to see if I could rival the ones you buy in the supermarket. I can say for definite that after 5 hours of prep, proving, baking and tasting you definitely can!

I found Paul Hollywood's recipe on BBC Good Food and set to this morning with hope and a fair amount of upper body strength for all that kneading required. I usually take photos throughout my bakes, but this one was a little different...

Being an enriched dough (you mix melted butter, full-fat milk and an egg into the dry ingredients) it is very sticky and as it begins to taken shape through all the kneading, it become very elastic, so getting it off your hands for starters is one challenge, taking a photos with your elbow becomes another.  I generally have my tame cameraman to help, but this time he was absent, nursing a hangover I imagine!

There is also a lot of proving with this recipe (3 hours in all!) so make sure you don't have a busy day ahead. I managed to go for a walk, tidy up and do a bit of admin whilst my buns were proving, so if you need to get the odd thing done around the house it's an excellent recipe. Once the second prove is complete you need to shape the dough into spheres and arrange on a baking tray. (Use lots of flour and make a 'cage' with your hand to swirl the dough around and make them round) To make sure that they all cook evenly, they also need to be roughly the same size and weight, so I decided to weigh them. Be prepared for quite a lot of sticky dough everywhere again, and you've guessed it, all over your hands!

Once they have finished their last prove, make a basic dough from plain flour and water, and pipe the crosses over the top. I think I made mine a little too thin as they didn't have that distinctive raised look and some started to meld into the dough below. However, give them 20 minutes in the oven, wait until they're golden drown, glaze with melted apricot jam straight from the oven and voila! deliciously tasty hot cross buns made by your own fair hand. As long as you can accept that you could have made 2 whole extra buns from the amount of dough left on your hands, worktop and bowl that you've had to wash off, you'll be fine!

The spiced honey butter, again from BBC Good Food, was made with salted butter, honey, cinnamon and ginger whisked together in a bowl. The recipe makes quite a lot, so if you're just planning on using it for one occasion, you may want to halve it for the number of buns. However, the honey is a perfect accompaniment to the lovely fruity taste, and spread on a still slightly warm hot cross bun, there's nothing better on a cold Sunday in February.

A Weekend of Baking...Mocha loaf cake with White chocolate ganache

As it was my Dad's birthday last week, I asked him to choose a cake that he wanted. He picked a mocha marbled loaf caked from the Great British Bake Off Book 'How to turn everyday bakes into Showstoppers'

It was a very simple sponge base that was split into two and then flavoured, one with coffee and the other with chocolate. The two different mixtures were then dolloped into the tin, swirled with a skewer to create the marbled effect and then baked. To top it all off I made a white chocolate ganache by taking cream up to a near-boiling point, and then melting white chocolate and butter into it. However, (as I found out the hard way) if you want to spread it, it needs to set until it holds its shape, which takes hours! I made it in the evening ready to put onto the cake, and ended up covering the bowl with clingfilm and going to bed (It was 12.30am!) You can put it in the fridge, but keep an eye on it or it will go too hard and will need setting over a pan of simmering water to soften it again, and then if it goes too far, you'll have to wait around all over again. It's a difficult beast!

Anyway, despite the slightly longer process of the icing than I had imagined, it was a very tasty cake, which cut well, held its shape and had a lovely buttery taste and texture like a madeira. Finished off with a dusting of cocoa powder it made the perfect accompaniment to a spot of birthday tea.