Chocolate hot cross buns

Chocolate hot cross buns are traditional British Easter buns with a delicious chocolate twist. If you enjoy traditional hot cross buns, it will be hard to resist these chocolate ones ;). Fragrant with warming spices and packed with raisins, dried cranberries, fresh orange zest and chocolate chips, they are wonderful toasted and spread with butter, but are also delicious simply eaten as they are. Traditionally, hot cross buns were enjoyed at the end of Lent, as a treat after fasting. Highly recommended!

Makes 12.

Ingredients for the chocolate hot cross buns:

• 500 g strong white bread flour
• 30 g cocoa powder
• 1 heaped tsp mixed spice
• ½ tsp ground nutmeg
• 70 g caster sugar
• ½ tsp salt
• 10 g dried yeast or 20 g fresh yeast
• 75 g butter, melted
• 250 ml milk
• 2 large eggs
• finely grated zest of 2 oranges
• 80 g raisins (or a mixture of dried cranberries and raisins)
• 140 g dark or milk chocolate chips, or chopped chocolate

Mix the flour and cocoa powder with the dried yeast (if using fresh yeast, first prepare a yeast starter). Add the remaining ingredients, apart from the raisins and chocolate, and knead, adding the melted butter towards the end. Knead for long enough to obtain a soft and elastic dough. Towards the end of kneading, add the chocolate chips and raisins and knead briefly until evenly distributed. Place the dough in a lightly floured bowl, cover with a tea towel and leave in a warm place until doubled in size (about 1½ hours).

Turn the dough out and knead briefly. Divide into 12 pieces and shape into smooth, even buns, approximately 105 g each. Arrange on a baking tray lined with baking paper, leaving some space between them; they will join together as they bake. Cover with a tea towel and leave to rise again for about 40 minutes, or longer, until doubled in size. Just before baking, pipe the cross paste over the risen buns, first in horizontal lines and then in vertical lines to create crosses.

Bake the chocolate hot cross buns in an oven preheated to 180°C for approximately 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and, while still hot, brush with the runny honey. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Ingredients for the crosses:

• 75 g plain flour
• 75 ml water

Immediately before decorating the buns, mix the flour and water together thoroughly. The paste should be thick enough not to run off the buns, but thin enough to pipe through a piping bag or a small food bag with one corner snipped off.

Ingredients for the glaze:

• 2 tbsp runny honey

Method for bread machine users:

Place all the yeast dough ingredients into the bread machine in the following order: liquid ingredients first, then dry ingredients, and finally the yeast. Select the ‘dough’ programme (kneading and first rise). Once the programme has finished, remove the dough, knead it lightly, and continue according to the main recipe above.

Enjoy!