Hot Cross Buns

Oh no, whiteweave
DD will probably not eat one anyway so the birds can be gf tomorrow
I bought her a couple in case she felt left out.

They look lovely nelliem. You've done the crosses so well. Yes. The dough is always sticky, no matter which recipe you use. Suppose it has to be otherwise it would be more like bread than bun.

Why thank you Alea I like to do my bit for Gransnet research ( modest smile emoji) I must have put on half a stone though, so a few long walks are needed ( then I go home and have tea and another hot cross bun as a reward.)It's all good, as they say.

They look lovely Nellie. In my opinion a wettish dough gives best results.

They look good nellie

Well here is the final result they look OK but I have not tried them yet. I think the dough was a wee bit too soggy.

Despite what the picture looks like they were not hanging from the wall.
I had to stand on a chair so I could take the photo.

I bought GF HCB from marks wasn't impressed DH had the luxury ones and they smelled wonderful. Mind you he is scuppered now as his blood sugar is too high.

spellcheck whitewave

I bought the normal ones and the gf ones in M&S this morning as I was in a rush, however the orange ones looked good.

I found some lurking in the freezer the other day which were left from last year. The pigeons have been enjoying them.

When I have made them myself we have eaten far too many!

wjotewave you have to eat them for breakfast not as well as breakfast

I go on my exercise bike. Sometimes. Or I miss out other (more nourishing) food to get round it.

jing why aren't you the size of a house - it isn't fair! If I so much as smell a bun I would put on a lb.

I've got my dough rising. How did that happen?

Baked a choccie cake too.

I once tried to make my own HCBs. Never again.

my Norfolk friend used to say "when they're brown they're done and when they're black they're buggered!!

Absolutely right PRINTMISS, I remember that well. My mum used to order the buns - usually 3 dozen! There were six of us, so a dozen were polished off for breakfast straight away. Then another dozen during the day and the final dozen for breakfast again on Holy Saturday.

One year, when I was 15 and cocky I offered to make them. Mum was stupid enough to believe that I knew what I was doing had every confidence in me because I'd brought some lovely buns home from a Domestic Science lesson a week or so previously, so she didn't bother to order any. They might have been OK if I'd remembered to put the sugar in . That year we had three dozen hot cross rocks.

Galen i usually put them in the oven on Gas Mark 4/5 (or whatever that is in lecky) for about 20-30 mins. I think. (I just rush to get them out when they smell done )

There was a baker up the road from us in the '40s who sold spice buns, something like hot cross buns. The smell came right down to our house.
Also spiced teacakes.

Ok Jaxie! I'm starting now!

Yes! I remember the queue. It was always me that had to go and stand in it! Oh, the sight of those hot cross buns though. So shiny and sticky looking. And, oh the smell!

Going back again to the 50's, you would not get hot cross buns in the shops before or after Good Friday. On Good Friday morning you would go to the bakers and queue for your hot cross buns, and when once the baker had sold out that was the end of it, no more.

But have you posters clocked the sugar content of commercially produced HCBs? If you're diabetic, they contain far too much sugar, so it's BE ar-ed to make your own!

They can take a while to rise because it's a heavy dough, with the egg, milk, and sugar. Perhaps wait until they are just touching? Remember you will need to hot the oven up, so leave room for that. Good luck. They will be delicious. Better than shop.

I❤️ Hot cross buns!

I have just put my HX buns in the top oven for a second proving and I am trying to warm it up to about 30 to 40C.
I am very unsure how long I should leave them for while trying to make sure it does not get too hot and kill the yeast.

With hot cross buns I am very much a traditionalist, they should have that specific spiced and fruited bun flavour or they are some other sort of bun altogether..

I have used Mary Berrys recipe.

Yes. We always used to go to the baker's shop down the road. The buns would come out from the back on huge wooden trays.

Other days you could get "six mixed buns please" for 6d. (Forties/early fifties)

Maybe I'm making this up in some cosy fantasy about a 1950s childhood, but I think when I was very young we had warm buns from the baker on Good Friday. They were spicier and somehow more substantial in texture than commercial ones now. Waitrose wholemeal version isn't bad though. We tried making our own a year or so ago but they went from pallid to burnt in seconds.