MUST TRY Dubai Chocolate Hot Cross Buns

Pistachio Hot Cross Buns

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Recipe Overview

Preparation time: 40 minutes plus 1 hour 15 minutes rising time

Cooking time: 35 minutes

Ingredients Needed

• 600g/21ozs plain all purpose or bread flour + 25g/1oz
• 1/2 cup/125ml/4flozs water
• 1 cup/250ml/8.8flozs milk
• A few drops green food colouring
• 1/4 cup/80g/2.8ozs honey
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon instant dried yeast
• 1.5 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon mixed spice
• 60g/2ozs butter, cubes, softened

Flour crosses

• 40g/1.41ozs. plain flour
• Around 3 tablespoons water to make paste

For Glaze

• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1/8 cup boiling water
• 1/2 teaspoon gelatine powder

For Filling

• 1 cup pistachio cream
• 1 cup Nutella

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Step-By-Step Cooking Instructions

Making the Tangzhong Roux

Step 1 - Make the tangzhong or water roux. Please don't let this step put you off. It makes a huge difference for the softest of buns. Take the 25g/1oz of flour and whisk with 1/2 cup of water in a saucepan until smooth. Heat on medium heat and stir until it thickens to become a roux. You want it to reach 65ºC/149ºF and it will take about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and add the milk in two lots and the honey and whisk until the honey melts. Whisk in the eggs, salt and green food colouring.

Preparing the Dough

Step 2 - Place the 600g/21oz flour, yeast, cinnamon, nutmeg and mixed spice in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook and whisk to combine.

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Kneading and First Rise

Step 3 - Add the tangzhong mixture to the flour mix and knead until elastic. Add a bit more flour if the mixture is too wet. Finally add the butter cubes one at a time. It needs to be elastic and stretchy but not break. You should be able to pull it apart between your fingers and see through it without it breaking. Roll it into a ball making sure that there are no cracks on top of the ball and allow it to rise in a warm place til triple its size. This can take 40-60 minutes.

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Preparing the Cross Mixture

Step 4 - Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Mix the cross ingredients together to make a pipeable paste and place in a small piping bag cutting a small hole at the end.

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Troubleshooting: your dough will be sticky but try not to add too much flour. A little is fine because flour varies from supplier to batch but adding too much will affect the texture of the buns. Instead, add a little flour and then lightly oil your hands just before shaping them.

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Shaping and Baking

Step 5 - Line a baking tray with high sides with parchment. Punch down the dough. Flour your hands and a surface and shape 12 buns around 100g/3.5ozs each (I weighed the dough just to keep it consistent). Place on the parchment and do not give these a long rise, as long as they puff up a bit that is perfect. Pipe crosses on top and then bake for 30 minutes.

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Glazing and Filling

Step 6 - To make the glaze, whisk the sugar, boiling water and gelatine until smooth and brush over the hot buns. If you don't have gelatine, you can glaze these with some warmed up apricot jam. Serve with butter.

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Other Hot Cross Bun Recipes You Might Like Triple CHOCOLATE Hot Cross Buns, Hot Cross Bun Loaf, Nutella Swirl Hot Cross Buns, Gluten Free Hot Cross Buns, Honey Butter Hot Cross Buns, Savoury Bacon, Cheese & Egg Hot Cross Buns

Personal Note

I made these hot cross buns the other day a few weeks before Easter because if you can't celebrate the year's best and longest long weekend ever with an onslaught of hot cross buns every morning for breakfast, then what is life all about? ;)

I also made these Dubai chocolate hot cross buns on the day of my mother's birthday. Long time readers will know that my parents moved to Singapore a few years ago and they live with my sister there.

I wished her a happy birthday and she explained her plans for her birthday. They were going to the Ritz Carlton for a lunch but it was her plans for dinner that really made me chuckle. They had found a restaurant where if you order 4 serves of noodles you can have as many dumplings as your birthday age. Later that day she sent me a photo of herself with 3 platters of dumplings! And neither my father or my sister were going to help her eat them so I think she is celebrating her birthday with a onslaught of dumplings!

So tell me Dear Reader, do you like hot cross buns? What food would you like an onslaught of?

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