Sour Cherry, Orange and Earl Grey Hot Cross Buns

If you’ve stopped by in the hopes of finding the standard Easter spring flowers and bunny rabbits and church bonnets and pretty, pretty candy covered chocolate eggs – you’re at the wrong place. If you’ve been here before you won’t be surprised that there’s not a pastel argyle jumper in sight.

But Easter is just a few days away so it’s only logical that I share an Easter recipe. Now I could claim that I’m being all ‘lets plan ahead like a proper food blogger and make something for a holiday before it happens rather than after it’s passed‘… or I could be realistic and admit that this is just an excuse to make Hot Cross Buns – ha!

It is coming into autumn in Sydney and although the weather these past few weeks has been decidedly more summer-esque than summer was, winter is just hiding in the wings, sticking its tongue out and giving everyone the stink-eye after the sun goes down each evening.

Fortunately this means I’ve been baking. And as much as I bemoan the over-commercialisation of grocery stores – stocking X-mas in October and Easter from mid-January – I’m a firm believer that Hot Cross Buns should be available year round. Now while I do appreciate a good traditional sultana and cinnamon version, I of course couldn’t make something quite that standard.

These started with a craving for Sour Cherries. However, can someone please tell me why a package labeled ‘tart cherries’ have added sugar, therefore rendering them sweet and not tart as promised? Oh well. I next went for orange. This morphed from juice to zest to just using the whole peel – packaged ‘mixed peel’ freaks me out a bit, wayyyy to much crap in it – rant-y today aren’t I?

Earl Grey was a last minute stroke of brilliance brought on by a new box of tea. Rant-y annnd modest, we’ve got it all covered here. FYI, there’s no modesty when it comes to cake, these are close enough to fall in that category. I’ve done a handy little how to if you want to know how to get the peel off an orange in one piece and create a lovely dice… looks like my long-ago-and-far-far-away lemon twist making, bartending days of old have served me well.

I had an idea of what I was going for in a dough and created a bit of a recipe inspiration mash-up using my own Whole Wheat Bread, Smitten Kitchen’s Challah and a Traditional Hot Cross Bun recipe. I am so chuffed with how these came out. The good news is I can now have Hot Cross Buns year round – the even better news is I have 12 [um, or 8 at last count] to enjoy immediately. Now to start making a list of what other flavours to experiment with! There are a few basic options below but tell me, do you have any to-die-for recommendations?!

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Cherry, Orange and Earl Grey Hot Cross Buns

Ingredients:

1 c boiling water plus extra water as needed
1 earl grey tea bag

1 packet dried yeast [7g or 2 1/4 tsp]
2 c organic unbleached white flour plus 1/4 c extra
2 c organic stone ground whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp sea salt
2 tsp cardamom [or 1 tsp each cardamom and cinnamon]

1/4 c neutral oil, such as grapeseed oil
2 eggs

1/2 c dried sour/tart cherries, diced or quartered
1/2 c orange peel from 1 large orange, diced

For crosses:
1/4 c unbleached white flour
2-3 Tbsp water

For glaze:
2 Tbsp apricot jam

Quick Method:

• Steep tea bag in water. Soak cherries in hot tea. Drain cherry pieces, reserving liquid and topping up to 1 c with extra water.
• Dissolve and proof yeast in tepid tea liquid.
• Mix 2 c flour with yeast liquid and beat 20 strokes. Mix in salt, spices, egg and oil. Mix in remaining 2 cups of flour and set aside for 2 mins. Dough is very sticky.
• Knead using dough throwing and resting in 2 min intervals for three rounds – don’t add extra flour.
• Toss cherries and peel with extra 1/4 c white flour. Knead into dough on round four and rest 2 minutes. Throw a final time and place in an oiled bowl. Cover with baking [parchment] paper and a tea towel, and let rise 1 hour.
• Punch down dough, turn over in bowl, cover and let rise 1 1/2 hours. Punch down again and knead once or twice in the bowl.
• Turn out onto a lightly floured bench-top. Divide dough into 12 pieces and roll into balls.
• Lightly oil sides of a roasting pan / rectangle baking pan and line base with baking [parchment paper] Place dough balls in pan, cover and let rise 45 minutes before turning on oven to pre-heat: 200 C [400 F].
• Stir flour and water for crosses to a smooth paste and pipe on in a grid pattern. Bake in the pre-heated oven for 18-20 minutes. Prepare the glaze by gently heating the jam, straining if you wish.
• Cool 10 mins in pan, turn out onto rack, brush still-warm buns with the jam glaze and leave to cool completely.
• Makes 12 full-size, ten-thousand times better than the bakery, Hot Cross Buns.

Full Method:

In a medium jug, steep earl grey teabag in boiling water for 4 mins. Remove teabag and add diced cherry pieces, allow to soak and plump for about 15 mins until liquid is warm-ish room temp. Remove cherry pieces from liquid and gently squeeze out excess liquid. Top up liquid with tepid water to make 1 cup.

Sprinkle yeast over tepid tea soaking liquid and stir to dissolve. Let sit for 5 minutes until foamy so you know the yeast is alive. Mix 2 c flour with yeast liquid and beat 20 strokes with a dough scraper or large wooden spoon. Mix in salt, spices, egg and oil and beat again. Mix in remaining 2 cups of flour and set aside to rest for 2 mins. You may need to get your hands in the bowl to get the last bit of flour incorporated.

This dough is very sticky but will hold shape – it is supposed to be that way. Knead using dough throwing [see here for explanation] and resting in 2 min intervals for three rounds – don’t add more flour or it will make the bread too dense. I used a scraper to pick-up the dough for each throw and it made it much easier.

Toss cherries and peel with extra 1/4 c white flour and knead into dough on round four. To get the fruit in you kind of press and cut and mash it around gently with a more traditional kneading style. If you add it at the beginning it makes the dough harder to knead – and the cherries would be mush by the end. Once incorporated, rest 2 minutes. Knead a final time – back to the throwing on this one – and place in an oiled bowl. Cover with baking [parchment] paper and a tea towel, and let rise 1 hour until doubled in size.

Punch down dough, turn over in bowl and let rise 1 1/2 hours. Punch down again and knead once or twice in the bowl to remove the air. Lightly oil sides of a roasting pan or rectangle baking pan and line base with baking [parchment paper].

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured bench-top. Divide into 12 pieces and roll into balls. Evenly space dough balls in pan. Cover with paper and towel and let rise 45 minutes before turning on oven to pre-heat: 200 C [400 F]. Stir flour and water for crosses to a smooth paste and pipe on in a grid pattern to create crosses. Bake in the pre-heated oven for 18-20 minutes. Prepare the glaze by gently heating the jam, straining if you wish.

Cool buns 10 mins in pan and turn out onto rack – you may need to run a knife around the edge to loosen a bit if the cross paste has stuck to the side. Brush still-warm buns with the jam glaze and leave to cool completely.

Serve with copious lashings of salted butter and a big cup of tea, declare you are never buying them from a store ever again. Makes 12 full-size Hot Cross Buns.

*Notes:

• Cherries: If you do find proper tart cherries without added sugar, add 1 Tbsp of honey to the tea water before dissolving the yeast.
• 12 pieces: I find that the easiest way to divide dough is to press into a disk and cut like a pizza into wedges. Simply roll wedges into balls. Each piece for me was about 85 g.
• Rising: If pressed for time you could skip the second rise and let the first one go for 1 1/2 hrs, but the flavour and texture really benefit from a second round before forming the rolls.

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Bonus round:

• Cinnamon & Sultanas: Swap cardamom for cinnamon and replace cherries and orange peel with sultanas. Use traditional black tea or just hot water to soak the sultanas.
• Ginger & Apricots: Replace cardamom with ginger and replace cherries with diced dried apricots. Keep orange peel and use green tea or hot water to soak apricots.
• White Choc & Cranberry: Use cloves instead of cardamom and reduce to 1 tsp. Replace cherries and orange peel with dried cranberries and white choc chips. Soak cranberries in white tea with rose.

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So there’s still no bunnies or chocolate eggs but I couldn’t let you out of here without a few autumn flowers – Happy Easter!

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