Traditional hot cross buns are basically bread rolls with bits and pieces of dried fruits, like raisins, cranberry, currant, apricot and other dried fruits that you can think of. Although raisins is the most common one, several variations also uses different kind of dried fruits. The buns is soft, somewhat chewy and slightly sticky on top, with the trademark of cross in top of each bread.
Ingredients
- 77 grams + 2 tablespoon cup Milk
- 1 1/4 teaspoon Active Dry Yeast
- 1 large Egg – room temperature
- 1 tablespoon Flavorless Oil
- 1 tablespoon granulated Sugar
- 2 tablespoon Brown Sugar
- 1 1/4 cup Bread Flour or All-purpose Flour
- 1/3 teaspoon Salt
- 1/3 teaspoon Cinnamon Powder
- 1/3 cup Chocolate Chips
- 1 tablespoon unsalted Butter (softened)
- Egg wash (optional) – 1 beaten egg + 1 tsp water
- Jam For brushing top of bread before serving
- 3 tablespoon melted Chocolate
Instructions
- Pour the milk into a mug and microwave it for about 25 seconds until it is lukewarm, NOT HOT (about 105 degrees F.). Pour in a mxing bowl. Add sugar and active yeast. Allow to sit for 10 minutes or until the top of the mixture looks foamy.Make sure that your yeast is not expired, otherwise it will not activate. If this happens, discard and do not continue. Get a new yeast before proceeding. If you continue using it, the bread will not rise and it will be dense and heavy.
- To the yeast mixture, add the egg, oil, brown sugar, remaining white sugar, bread flour and salt. Knead for at least 15 minutes until thick, sticky dough forms and all the flour is incorporated. Add softened butter and conitnue kenading for another 15 minutes. The dough will break apart, that is ecpected. Keep kneading until it comes back together to form a ball of dough. If the dough is too sticky, add 1 tbsp of flour but do not add too much as it could make the bread dense and heavy. What you are aiming for is a smooth, soft and elastic bread dough that do not stick too much your palm. The side of the bowl is clean, while the dough still slightly stick to the bottom of the bowl. On the other hand if the dough is too dry add 1/2 teaspoon of milk or water at a time until the dough reach the smooth consistency. Allow at least 1-2 minutes before adding more liquid to allow the dough to absorb the liquid.
- Place dough into a greased bowl, cover with a towel, and allow to rise in a warm place for an hour, or until doubled in size.
- In a small bowl,melt chocolate. Set aside to let cool completely. Transfer in a ziplock sandwich bag and set aside.
- Generously sprinkle flour on the counter where you are going to work on your dough. Sprinkle some flour on your hands too for easy handling of dough. Take the dough out from the bowl and lightly push the dough down with the heel of the palm of your hands. Add chocolate chips and mix until just combine. Divide the bread dough into 6 portion. You can use a kitchen scale for even size, but if you do not have one, you can just estimate the size. Roll each pieces in the counter to form a ball. Do this for the rest of the dough and arrange side by side in a rectangular pan lined with parchment paper.
- Cover and let the dough rest for another 60 minutes in a warm place. You are aiming for a roll that is puff-up and almost double in size.
- Brush top with Eggwash (optional): This step is totally optional, but if you want a nice browning and glossy top, then give this a go. The eggwash will not affect the taste, so no big deal if you skip it. This is more for physical look.
- Pre-heat the oven while the bread rest for another 15 minutes or until the oven is pre-heated. If you are using to oven to let the bread rest, do NOT forget to take it out before pre-heating the oven.
- Bake for 23 – 25 minutes. At 10 minutes mark, cover the top with alumimun foil to avoid too much browning of the top.
- Let the bread cool slightly to allow the texture to build up. This is very important, if you serve it immediately the bread will still be wet.
- For the sticky part, brush the top of the buns with jam. If you do not have jam, brush the top with butter, it wil not have a glossy shiny look and sticky feel but it will still taste great. Let the jam glaze set before putting the melted chocolate for the cross mark on top.
- Snip the tip of the ziplock with the flour mixture. Put a cross on top of each bread. I like to just draw a straight horizontal line end to end, then another straight vertical line end to end. Let the chocolate solidy at bit.
