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Cinnamon Poppy Seed Babkas

Posted on May 26, 2023 by The quirk and the cool

These pastries are delicious and are filled with cinnamon butter and poppy seeds, raisins and lemon zest. The dough is a simple enriched dough, made surprisingly with plain flour rather than strong flour. This gives the babkas a soft texture and they’re very easy to eat! These babkas are based on a recipe I learnt at a wonderful workshop run by Burnt Honey Bakery, in Copacabana on the central coast of NSW, here made with my own variations.

Instant yeast is used, and in this instance, if you can get hold of Le Saffre Instant Dried Yeast, all the better. It’s perfect for rising enriched doughs. If you can’t get hold of the brand, use standard instant yeast and increase the amount by 50%.

Ingredients

275g milk (room temperature)
1 free-range egg (room temperature)
9g instant yeast (use Le Saffre if possible)
510g plain flour
90g caster sugar
9g salt
80g unsalted butter in small pieces (softened)

Cinnamon filling

65g brown sugar
25g ground cinnamon
110g unsalted butter at room temperature

Poppy seed filling

50g raisins, chopped
20g poppy seeds
15g milk
50g caster sugar
Zest of half a lemon

Glaze

50g caster sugar
25g water
10g poppy seeds

Method

For the dough, mix the milk and egg together and whisk in the yeast. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the flour, sugar and salt. Scatter the butter pieces through the dough. Add the milk, egg and yeast mixture. Turn the mixer onto low and mix to combine the ingredients. Continue to mix on low until everything is incorporated and the mixture looks like a dough. Increase the speed to medium and mix for about 10 minutes. After 10 minutes check to see if the dough windowpanes. The dough should be lovely and stretchy, and pass the windowpane test if you pull and stretch a small section – it should be translucent.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or my favourite, a plastic shower cap, and leave to prove for 1-2 hours until doubled in size. Press the dough down, and then place the bowl in the fridge for 2 hours. The dough will develop some more plus firm up to help with the next stage of shaping.

Meanwhile make the fillings and glaze. For the cinnamon filling, beat the ingredients until smooth and creamy. For the poppy seed filling, blitz the raisins in a food processor, then add the other ingredients and blitz briefly until combined. To make the glaze, dissolve the sugar in the water in a saucepan over a medium heat, bring to the boil then remove from the heat and set aside.

Remove the dough from the fridge and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide into 10 pieces. Gently roll each piece into a rectangle. Spread each rectangle with some cinnamon filling, spreading to the edges. Place 2 or 3 dabs of poppy seed filling on the rectangle too. You don’t need very much as it’s quite strong.

Roll up each rectangle along the long side. Starting at one end, cut right down the middle longways, leaving a couple of centimetres at the top. Twist each strip together, and fold the ends together in a loose knot.

Place each babka on a baking tray lined with baking paper. You will need 2 trays. Cover each tray with a large plastic bag and place the trays in the fridge overnight or for several hours.

2 hours before baking, remove the babkas from the fridge to come to room temperature and for the final prove. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees C fan. Place the trays in the oven and bake for 15 minutes until a burnished brown.

Remove from the oven and brush each babka with the sugar syrup, sprinkling with some poppy seeds.

Serve warm or at room temperature – these babkas are definitely best eaten on the day they’re made!

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Swedish Cardamom Buns

Posted on July 2, 2022 by The quirk and the cool

A very exciting time in the Quirk and the Cool kitchen! I have recently acquired an Ankarsrum mixer from the incredible people at Blackwood Lane in Melbourne in Victoria. It’s Swedish, and an incredibly efficient and powerful machine, particularly for producing dough.

So it seemed appropriate to make something Swedish for the first use of the machine!

I love sweet rolls, scrolls and buns, but I haven’t yet made kanelbullar (cinnamon buns) or kardemummabullar (cardamom buns).

This recipe is adapted from the Ankarsrum cook book, and is technically a cinnamon bun recipe. But I think the cardamom flavour is outstanding, so I’m calling these cardamom buns.

The Ankarsrum performed well with making the enriched dough. And making and shaping the knots was pretty easy.

Well done to my Ankarsrum mixer!

Here is my tweaked recipe for the rolls. I halved the quantities and added in a whole egg. You might like to bake at a slightly lower temperature. I baked the rolls pictured at 220 degrees C which was a little too hot.

It goes without saying that you could follow this recipe in a KitchenAid or similar.

Dough

Ingredients

75g softened butter

50g sugar

1 free-range egg, beaten

250mls milk

420g strong flour

1 teaspoon ground cardamom seeds

7g instant yeast

7g salt

Filling

100g very soft butter

100g sugar

1/2 beaten free-range egg, for brushing

2 teaspoons Demerara or raw sugar

1 tablespoon cinnamon

Method

Mix the soft butter, sugar and egg together in your mixer, to just incorporate. Add the milk, and mix to combine.

Put the flour into a bowl, and stir in the ground cardamom seeds. Put the yeast on top of the flour, and the salt on the opposite side.

With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture a little at a time to the mixer bowl. Continue to knead until the dough is soft and elastic and passes the window pane test.

Cover the dough with a plastic bag, towel or my favourite, a plastic shower cap. Leave to prove in a warm place for 1 hour.

Meanwhile make the filling by mixing the butter, sugar and cinnamon together with a palette knife until it’s a smooth paste.

The dough should now have doubled in size. Remove the dough and place on a floured board or bench. Gently roll the dough to a large rectangle about 45 x 30 cm.

Spread the filling over the whole rectangle. Halve the rectangle, putting the long sides together, to make a smaller rectangle 45 x15 cm. Cut into 12 strips. You will have enough dough to trim the uneven ends. You can bake these as scraps!

Pull each strip lengthwise, twist several times, and form into a knot. There are videos on YouTube that can help you if you’re not sure – that’s what I used.

Place on a baking tray lined with baking paper, cover with a large plastic bag or tea towel, and leave to prove for an hour.

15 minutes before baking, preheat your oven to 220 degrees C, or 210 degrees C if you want your buns less “well done”.

Brush the proved buns with beaten egg and sprinkle with sugar. Place the baking tray into the oven and bake for 10 minutes.

Remove from the oven. Serve them warm as is or spread with a little salted butter.

Best eaten on the day, but they microwave beautifully a day or so later!

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Hot Cross Buns 2022

Posted on April 4, 2022 by The quirk and the cool

I really look forward to baking hot cross buns each Easter. And each Easter I try a new recipe or tweak one of my old ones. They’re all delicious – I’ve never met a hot cross bun I didn’t like!

So I’m a bit late this year, but I will be making the 2022 version later this week.

But in the meantime, here are the links to my favourite hot cross buns, from the experts from the Great British Bake-off, to Jamie Oliver and Paul Hollywood, to my own sourdough version.

So long as the buns are beautifully baked a deep golden brown and served with lashings of butter, you can’t go wrong.

Great British Bakeoff Hot Cross Buns: https://thequirkandthecool.com/2019/04/19/hot-cross-buns-great-british-bake-off/

A great recipe with lots of fruit and spice including an apple.

Jamie Oliver Inspired Hot Cross Buns: https://thequirkandthecool.com/2016/03/26/hot-cross-buns-jamie-oliver-inspired/

I like this recipe with stem ginger in the original bread mix plus cranberries as well as sultanas in the fruit.

Paul Hollywood’s Hot Cross Buns:https://thequirkandthecool.com/2015/04/03/paul-hollywoods-hot-cross-buns/

A bit more work with this recipe with 3 provings but a great resulting flavour.

Sourdough Hybrid Hot Cross Buns:https://thequirkandthecool.com/2021/03/23/sourdough-hybrid-hot-cross-buns/

If you have a sourdough starter, my recipe makes a delicious hot cross bun with a beautiful flavour!

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Shetland Buns

Posted on January 29, 2022 by The quirk and the cool

I visited Shetland pre-pandemic when we could travel from home in Australia to the UK. I was so taken with the islands – the breathtaking scenery, the wildlife, the history and culture and of course the food!

This recipe is based on a recipe called Yeast Buns from Margaret B Stout’s “Cookery for Northern Wives” published in 1925. This book documents many Shetland recipes and was an insight into traditional cooking.

I made and blogged the buns a while back, see here. I’ve made a few more tweaks this time. The original recipe makes a lot of buns! So this time I divided the recipe in two, making a batch of 12 buns and I also made a lovely large fruit bun, with lemon icing.

I converted the imperial measurements to metric. doing a little bit of rounding up or down, but as I wanted to keep the integrity of the original measurements, I didn’t change anything too drastically.

I’ve also adapted the recipe to make in a KitchenAid or similar.

I’ve tweaked the ingredients in these ways. I substituted instant yeast for fresh yeast. I added a lot more more dried fruit than in the original, adding extra fruit again for the large fruit bun. I also added some more flavour in the form of vanilla extract and almond essence, as well as cinnamon and allspice.

I made the large fruit bun in a paper panettone case, but you could make it in a large high sided cake tin. You would end up with a slightly wider bun, but with less height.

Ingredients

For the sponge

227g strong flour

9g instant yeast

1 teaspoon caster sugar

426 mls milk

Mixture

567g strong flour

113g caster sugar

113g butter

2 free range eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 teaspoon almond extract

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 teaspoon allspice

113g sultanas

113g raisins

100g candied orange

100g sour cherries (for the large bun)

Glaze

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon milk

Icing

200g icing sugar

Juice of half a lemon

The ingredients (except for the cherries) are for both the little buns and the big one. Divide the mixture in half after proving and before shaping.

Method

Here is the method, adapted from the rather scant instructions given by Margaret Stout.

For the sponge, sieve the flour into a large bowl, then add the yeast and sugar. Gradually add the lukewarm milk, stirring to make a smooth batter. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a tea towel or a disposable plastic shower cap. Leave to rise in a warm place for an hour.

Prepare the rest of the mixture. Put the flour, caster sugar and butter into the bowl of a KitchenAid fitted with a dough hook and mix until thoroughly combined. Add the sponge mixture, beaten eggs, vanilla extract, almond essence, cinnamon and allspice. Mix well, for for at least 5 minutes until the dough is elastic and passes the window pane test.

Cover the mixture in the bowl with plastic wrap/tea towel/plastic shower cap and leave to rise again for 1 ½ hours.

Remove the risen dough and stretch into a large rectangle. Scatter the sultanas, raisins and candied orange, a small amount at a time, over the dough, folding the dough over after each addition. You want to incorporate the fruit as evenly as you can into the dough.

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C fan forced.

Now divide the dough into two.

Take one half of the dough and divide into 12 pieces. Shape each into a ball and place on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Cover the tray loosely with a tea towel or large plastic bag and prove for 30 minutes in a warm place.

Take the other half of the dough, and stretch into a large rectangle. Scatter the sour cherries a small amount at a time, over the dough, folding the dough over after each addition.

Shape the dough into a large ball and place in a panettone case or large cake tin. Cover with a tea towel or plastic bag and prove for an hour in a warm place.

When the small buns have proved, put them into the preheated oven and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until the buns are a deep brown colour.

Remove the buns from the oven, and while warm, brush the tops of the buns with a tablespoon of sugar mixed with a tablespoon of milk.

When the large bun has finished proving, put it in the oven and bake for 20 -25 minutes or until a deep brown colour.

Remove the large bun from the oven and leave to cool.

For the icing, mix the icing sugar with the lemon juice to make a thick lemon paste. You may need to adjust either ingredient to get the right consistency.

If you think the buns need zhushing, you could drizzle a little of the icing for the big bun over the tops. I made this icing a little more “drippy” by adding in more lemon juice. However I iced some and also left some plain.

Both the small buns and the large bun keep well as they are enriched with milk, butter and eggs. They are quite soft, and they remain soft even after a couple of days.

You could eat either bun as is or butter liberally – I even toasted the small buns the next day and ate with lashings of butter!

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Totally Orange Chelsea Buns

Posted on September 2, 2021 by The quirk and the cool

We all love Chelsea buns, myself included. I’ve made a lot! I’ve posted a couple of versions here and also here.

Yesterday I made sourdough and had left over sourdough starter. It is always a dilemma – what to do with your sourdough starter discard.

So I made Chelsea buns, using the left over starter, and a little commercial yeast as well. But you could totally make these buns using just yeast – we don’t all have a sourdough starter on hand! Use 7g yeast and up the milk to 150g.

These Chelseas are heavily flavoured with orange, in the dough and in the filling – juice, zest and candied orange. And some orange liqueur as well!

Very orange and delicious.

Ingredients

Dough

400g strong flour

125g sourdough starter discard

3g yeast

8g salt

50g caster sugar

2 free range eggs, at room temperature

100g tepid milk

Zest and juice of half an orange*

50g unsalted butter

Filling

50g sour cherries

50g cranberries

50g sultanas

50mls orange liqueur

50g very soft butter

50g golden caster sugar or raw sugar

100g marzipan

1 tablespoon finely chopped candied orange

Golden Syrup Glaze

2 tablespoons golden syrup heated to use as glaze

Orange Icing

Juice of 1/4 orange

100g icing sugar or enough icing sugar to make a dripping icing

* a blood orange if you can get it

Method

Put all the dough ingredients except the butter into the bowl of an electric mixer such as a KitchenAid. Mix with a dough hook or wooden spoon to a rough dough, cover and leave for 30 minutes to autolyse.

Knead the dough using the dough hook of the electric mixer for about 10 minutes or until smooth and elastic.

Add the butter, in small pieces, which needs to be very soft. You can soften the butter in the microwave. Mix using the dough hook until the dough is smooth, soft and windowpanes.

Cover the dough with cling wrap or plastic shower cap and leave to prove somewhere warm for 2-3 hours. (If using all yeast without sourdough starter, leave to rise for 1-2 hours only). The dough should have risen, if not quite doubled in size.

Line a large baking tin with baking paper. I used a 24cm (9.5 inch) round spring form tin, but you could equally use a rectangular 22cm x 23cm (9 inch x 13 inch) tin.

Remove the proven dough from the bowl onto a lightly floured board. Using floured hands, gently stretch the dough to a large rough rectangle.

For the filling, soak the sour cherries, cranberries and sultanas in the liqueur for 30 minutes to 1 hour. Spread the very soft butter all over the dough rectangle. Sprinkle the sugar over the butter. Scatter the chopped marzipan, chopped candied orange and then the dried fruit over the dough.

Now roll up the dough along the long side, as carefully as you can.

Cut the long roll into 12 even pieces. Place the pieces into the baking tin, cut side up, packing them in snugly together. If using a round tin, make a ring of buns in the tin and then put the remaining buns in the centre.

Put the tin into a large plastic bag to prove. Place into the fridge overnight or for 8-12 hours.

Half an hour before baking, preheat the oven to 160 degrees C fan or 180 degrees C non fan forced. Add a cast iron pan of water to the bottom of the oven to create steam for baking.

Take the tin out of the plastic bag and place the buns in the oven. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until the tops of the buns are golden brown but not burnt.

Once baked, remove from the oven. Brush the tops of the buns with the warmed golden syrup.

When cool, remove the buns from the tin, peeling off the baking paper.

To make the orange icing, mix the orange juice with the icing sugar. You may need more or less icing sugar – use enough to make an icing of dripping consistency.

Once the buns are quite cool, drizzle the orange icing over the tops of the buns.

Best eaten on the day!

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Sourdough Cinny Scrolls

Posted on August 6, 2021 by The quirk and the cool

I love sourdough and I love cinnamon scrolls so I have been keen to develop a cinnamon scrolls recipe using the great flavours of sourdough.

It’s been a labour of love, with lots of trial and error, but my latest version is really good and I’m very happy!

Like any sourdough recipe, it takes a bit of time, but those gorgeous soft brioche style scrolls are well worth the extra time!

The scrolls are filled with a butter brown sugar cinnamon mixture and sit in some gooey caramel while baking. Once baked the tops glazed with golden syrup and finally, when cool, drizzled with lemon icing.

Ingredients

Dough

400g strong flour

200g sourdough starter

8g salt

50g caster sugar

3 free range eggs, at room temperature

100g tepid milk

100g unsalted butter

Caramel Sauce

75g unsalted butter

125g light brown sugar

50g maple syrup

Cinnamon Filling

150g light brown sugar

1 heaped tablespoon ground cinnamon

100g unsalted butter, very soft

Golden Syrup Glaze

2 tablespoons golden syrup heated to use as glaze

Lemon Icing

Juice of 1/4 lemon

200g icing sugar or enough icing sugar to make a dripping icing

Method

In a large bowl add all the dough ingredients except the butter. Mix to a rough dough, cover and leave for 30 minutes to autolyse.

Using a dough hook of an electric mixer, knead the dough for about 10 minutes or until smooth and silky.

Now add butter, in small pieces, which needs to be very soft. You can soften the butter in the microwave. Mix using the dough hook until the mixture is smooth and elastic. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and leave to prove somewhere warm for 4 hours. The dough should have risen slightly.

To make the caramel, melt the butter, brown sugar and maple syrup in a small saucepan over a low heat.

Line a large baking pan with baking paper. I use 22cm x23cm (9 inch x 13 inch) pan. Spoon the caramel sauce over the base. You don’t have to use all the sauce – the more you use the gooier the scrolls will be. I sometimes only use half the caramel for a less gooey bottom.

Remove the proven dough from the bowl onto a lightly floured board. Using floured hands, gently stretch the dough to a rough rectangle, slightly less than the size of your pan.

For the cinnamon filling, mix the brown sugar and cinnamon together.

Spread the very soft butter all over the dough rectangle. Sprinkle the brown sugar and cinnamon over the butter.

Now roll up the dough along the long side, as carefully as you can, as the dough is very soft.

Cut the long roll into 12 even pieces. Place the pieces into the baking pan, cut side up, on top of the caramel sauce, packing them in snugly together.

Put the pan into a large plastic bag to prove. Leave at room temperature for an hour then place into the fridge overnight or for 8-12 hours. Or, if you wanted to prove more quickly, leave in a warm place for 2 hours. I recommend the fridge prove as it really improves the flavour.

Half an hour before baking, preheat the oven to 160 degrees C fan or 180 degrees C non fan forced. Add a pan of water to the bottom of the oven to create steam for baking.

Take the pan out of the plastic bag and place the scrolls in the oven. Bake for 30-40 minutes, until the tops of the scrolls are golden brown but not burnt.

Once baked, remove from the oven. Brush the tops of the scrolls with the warmed golden syrup.

To make the lemon icing, mix the lemon juice with the icing sugar. You may need more or less icing sugar – use enough to make an icing of dripping consistency.

One the scrolls are quite cool, drizzle the lemon icing over the tops of the scrolls.

Remove the scrolls from the pan and peel off the baking paper. The scrolls will be sticky with the caramel sauce underneath.

Best eaten on the day while the scrolls are gooey. They can be microwaved gently the next day if you have any left over!

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Sourdough Hybrid Hot Cross Buns

Posted on March 23, 2021 by The quirk and the cool

I love Easter and all the baking opportunities it provides. There are so many traditional recipes with strong cultural or religious origins, and I’m as fascinated with the history of the recipes as much as with the delicious pastries and bakes themselves.

But hot cross buns are my favourite. As a bread baker I guess this is to be expected! I always make them at Easter, having a go at a different recipe each year. But in 2021 I decided to develop my own version. I have had so much experience baking with sourdough recently that I thought I could use some of that know how in a hot cross bun recipe. So this recipe is a hybrid – it uses both dry yeast and some sourdough starter. The result are well risen, light and flavourful buns.

The recipe makes 16 – but if you only want to bake 12, I have included the quantities to bake a dozen – see below.

For the observant readers who have counted 15 buns in the photos, I actually managed to get 17 buns from the dough! So I decided to bake two buns on another tray.

Ingredients

Buns

250g mix of sultanas and raisins

40mls Pedro Ximinez or port or muscat

625g strong flour

7g dried yeast

12g salt

125g sourdough starter

Zest of 1/2 an orange

Zest of 1/2 a lemon

I teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice

1/2 teaspoon each of ground ginger and cloves

50g brown sugar

30g golden syrup

2 medium free-range eggs, well beaten

60g unsalted butter, in small pieces

200g full fat milk at room temperature

150g apple juice

50g candied orange peel

Cross

75g flour

75g water

3 teaspoons caster sugar

Glaze

50g caster sugar

50g golden syrup

100g water

Method

Soak the raisins and sultanas in the Pedro Ximinez or port or muscat for up to 3 hours to plump up the fruit.

Starting with the flour, add all the other ingredients (except dried fruit and candied orange peel) to a large bowl. Just make sure the yeast is on one side of the bowl and salt on the other.

Mix everything roughly together using a wooden spoon, just to amalgamate the ingredients. Leave to rest for 20 minutes.

Using the dough hook of an electric mixer, knead on low speed for 10 minutes until the dough is soft, shiny and passes the windowpane test. This dough is initially quite wet, so it will take 10 minutes kneading to bring it to that lovely elastic consistency you are looking for.

Add the sultanas, raisins and any residual alcohol that hasn’t soaked into the fruit, and the candied orange peel. Mix for about a minute on low to distribute the fruit evenly through the dough.

Remove the bowl from the machine and cover with a plastic bag or tea towel. Leave to prove in a warm place for 2 hours.

The dough should have doubled in size. Carefully remove the risen dough from the bowl and place on a board or bench top which has been lightly floured. Putting a little more flour on your hands to stop the dough from sticking, flatten the dough to a rough rectangle, and fold in half lengthways. Cut in two and roll each half into a sausage.

You should get 16 hot cross buns from the mixture. Take one sausage and divide into two, then divide each into 4 pieces.

To shape your buns, take one piece and roll into a ball, and with your cupped hand over the top of the ball, keep rolling on the board or bench top till you feel the dough tightening and developing a nice ball shape.

Repeat with remaining balls. Do the same thing with the other sausage.

Place the 16 balls – now buns – onto a large baking tray lined with baking paper.

Cover with a large plastic bag or a tea towel and leave to prove again. I prove this second time in the fridge overnight. You can also prove at room temperature for an hour or more until the buns have grown a little in size. (They don’t get huge – this happens in the oven.)

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees C fan forced or 190 degrees C non fan for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the crosses by mixing the flour, water and sugar in small bowl. Use a bit of judgement here – you want a paste that is not too runny, but not so stiff that it can’t be piped. So add/subtract flour and water to get the right consistency. Fill a piping bag or a zip lock bag that you can cut the corner off with the cross mixture, and pipe lines across each row of buns, then pipe another set of lines at right angles to the first set to make the crosses.

If you’re in any doubt how to do this, YouTube has how-to videos!

Put the tray into the oven and bake for 25-30 minutes until the buns are a dark golden brown.

As you can see from the colour of the buns in the photos, my buns are a deep burnished colour. But they are soft and moist inside!

While the buns are baking, make the glaze. Put the caster sugar, golden syrup and water into a small saucepan and heat gently on the stovetop stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Simmer for 2 or 3 minutes until the glaze has thickened slightly.

Once the buns are cooked, remove from the oven. Brush the warm syrup over the warm buns, making sure you brush the sides as well.

When the buns have cooled slightly, eat with lashings of good quality butter. The next day, split and toast and serve with, of course, more butter!

Hot cross buns freeze well too, so make a pile that you can store in the freezer and reheat as necessary.

NB Reheat in the oven, the buns don’t do well in the microwave.

Quantities for 12 hot cross buns

(Some quantities stay the same as it doesn’t make a huge difference to alter these quantities).

200g mix of sultanas and raisins

40mls Pedro Ximinez or port or muscat

450g strong flour

7g dried yeast

10g salt

100g sourdough starter

Zest of 1/2 an orange

Zest of 1/2 a lemon

I teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice

1/2 teaspoon each of ground ginger and cloves

40g brown sugar

20g golden syrup

2 medium free-range eggs, well beaten

50g unsalted butter, in small pieces

150g full fat milk at room temperature

100g apple juice

50g candied orange peel

Cross

75g flour

75g water

3 teaspoons caster sugar

Glaze

50g caster sugar

50g golden syrup

100g water

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Boozy Buns with Raisins and Sultanas

Posted on September 9, 2020 by The quirk and the cool

 


I’m a huge fan of buns, rolls or scrolls, any kind of bread with a sweet filling. I usually make cinnamon scrolls, which are always delicious. This time I wanted to make some sweet buns using boozy fruit from the jar in my store cupboard.

I keep a jar permanently in the cupboard with raisins and sultanas soaking in alcohol. I top up the jar with rum or brandy or even whisky, whatever I have on hand. Stick in a vanilla pod, give the mixture a stir and leave the fruit to macerate. The boozy fruit makes a delicious dessert served over ice cream or with cream or yoghurt, or as a filling for cakes or pastries.

These yeasted buns are full of luscious fruit and almond frangipane, rolled like a scroll, and finished with a golden syrup glaze while still warm. They are pretty easy to make, particularly if you use a mixer with a dough hook. You will need to use a bit of elbow grease if you knead by hand!

Start the buns the day before you want to bake them, and leave in the fridge overnight for the second prove. Then bake them first thing in the morning and eat them warm from the oven for breakfast if you can’t resist the smell of freshly baked sticky buns!

Ingredients 

For the Dough

500g strong flour

7g instant yeast

10g salt

50g caster sugar

250g milk

2 large free range eggs, beaten

50g butter

For the Frangipane

50g butter

50g sugar

60g ground almonds

1 large free range egg

1/2 teaspoon almond essence

Filling + Glaze

300g boozy raisins and sultanas (If you don’t have a jar of prepared fruit, simply put the fruit in a bowl and cover with 1/2 cup of rum, brandy or whisky. Leave to soak for 1/2-1 hour)

100g golden syrup

Icing

100g icing sugar with a little water to make a paste

Method

Put the strong flour into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook or into a large mixing bowl if kneading by hand. Add the instant yeast and salt, making sure the yeast and salt are on opposite sides of the bowl, and the caster sugar. Add the milk which you have warmed to tepid (microwaving is easy) and the beaten eggs. Mix by hand into a rough dough, even if you’re going to use the dough hook in the next stage.

Cover the bowl with a tea towel or my favourite, a plastic shower cap, and rest for 20 minutes. Then move the bowl to the mixer and knead with the dough hook until the mixture is smooth and starting to develop some elasticity, about 5 minutes. Add the butter in small pieces, then knead again for about 5 minutes, using the mixer until the butter is thoroughly incorporated, the dough is smooth and you can achieve the “windowpane” effect. That is, you can pull  some of the dough off the dough hook, between two fingers, stretching it so that it’s translucent.

If you are kneading by hand, you will knead to work the dough really well, in both stages, to get it to the desired silky, elastic stage.

Cover the bowl again and leave in a warm place to prove for about an hour, until the dough is doubled in size. You ideally need a temperature of about 25 degrees C. In winter in Sydney it can be hard to get that temperature, so I usually resort to leaving the bowl near the heating source, and even giving it an extra 30 minutes plus if the dough hasn’t doubled in size.

Make the frangipane while the dough is proving. Put all the ingredients into a food processor and mix. Or you can beat the ingredients together by hand. Either way you want to end up with a smooth paste.

Once the dough is risen, take the dough out of the bowl onto the bench top or ideally a large wooden board. Flour the bench top or board liberally with flour. Flour a rolling pin and roll the dough into a large rectangle, as large as you can go, with the dough ending up about 1/2 cm thick. My dough rectangle is usually about 30cm in width by 40-50cm in length.

Smear the frangipane over the entire rectangle of dough. It will look like you haven’t got quite enough, but keep on spreading and you will cover the rectangle.

Drain your boozy raisins and sultanas, and scatter them over the dough. Now carefully roll up the dough along the long side. Using a sharp knife, slice the dough. You should get about 12 slices, give or take.

Line a large baking tin or tray with baking paper. Carefully place each slice, cut side up, into the tin or tray, fitting them snugly together.

Place the tin or tray into a large plastic bag. You will need to make sure you have enough room in your fridge, as you are going to prove the buns in there overnight. Put the tin or tray into the fridge, and leave for 8-12 hours overnight.

When ready to bake, preheat your oven to 180 degrees C fan forced, or 200 degrees C non fan forced. Place a baking tray, or ideally a cast iron pan, in the bottom of the oven, with some water in it, to create steam for your baking.

Remove the plastic bag from the tin/tray and put the buns straight from the fridge into the preheated oven. Bake for 20 minutes or until the buns are risen and a deep golden brown.

Remove the buns from the oven. Warm the golden syrup to make it spreadable – 30 seconds in the microwave on low, or gently heat in a saucepan.

While the buns are still still warm, brush all over with the golden syrup. Be generous! You want the buns to be really sticky!

Pull the buns apart, and eat while warm – they are truly delicious and moreish. Or wait till they are cool, and drizzle over some icing. Make the icing by adding water, a teaspoon at a time, to the icing sugar, until you have a paste that you can drizzle over the buns – not too thick but not too runny.

An easy way to drizzle is to put the icing in a zip lock bag and snip the corner off. You can squeeze the icing out of your makeshift piping bag.

Or even easier – dip a fork in the icing and drizzle straight over the buns!

Whether you eat warm or at room temperature, ice or not, these buns are super yummy. They keep for a couple of days, and also freeze well.

But best eaten on the day!

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