Cranberry and orange sweet rolls

These wonderful winter sweet rolls are filled with cranberry and orange, creating a beautifully fragrant and vibrant flavour combination with a bright citrus note. Shaped into traditional swirls, they are so delicious that they disappeared in no time at all ;). The perfect treat to make the wait for Christmas a little sweeter.

Makes 12 sweet rolls.

Ingredients for the yeast dough:

• 540 g strong white bread flour
• 80 g caster sugar
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• 10 g dried yeast or 20 g fresh yeast
• 75 g butter, melted
• 250 ml milk
• 2 large eggs

Mix the flour with the dried yeast (if using fresh yeast, prepare a yeast starter first). Add the remaining ingredients and knead the dough, incorporating the melted butter towards the end. Knead thoroughly until the dough becomes soft, smooth and elastic. Place into a lightly floured bowl, cover with a tea towel and leave in a warm place until doubled in size, approximately 1½ hours.

Once risen, roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface into a rectangle measuring approximately 40 x 50 cm. Spread the cranberry filling evenly over the dough. Starting from the shorter side, roll the dough up tightly like a Swiss roll. Using a sharp knife, cut into slices approximately 3–3.5 cm thick, creating 12 equal rolls.* Arrange the rolls in a 23 x 33 cm baking tin lined with baking parchment. The rolls should be close enough to touch as they rise. Cover with a tea towel and leave to rise for approximately 30 minutes, or until doubled in size.

Bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for approximately 25 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly. While still warm, drizzle generously with the orange icing. Pull apart and serve.

Ingredients for the cranberry and orange filling:

• 400 g cranberries, fresh or frozen
• 120 g sugar
• finely grated zest of 1 orange
• freshly squeezed juice of ½ orange

Place the cranberries, sugar, orange zest and orange juice into a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat until the sugar dissolves and most of the cranberries burst. Bring to the boil and simmer for 2–3 minutes, until slightly thickened. Remove from the heat and allow to cool completely.

Ingredients for the orange icing:

• 1 cup icing sugar
• 3 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice

Finely grated zest of 1 orange. Mix the icing sugar, orange juice and zest together until smooth, either with the back of a spoon or using a mixer. Adjust the consistency as needed: add more orange juice if the icing is too thick, or more icing sugar if it is too thin.

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.

* A useful alternative is to cut the rolls using a piece of thread or unflavoured dental floss. Slide it under the rolled dough, cross the ends over the top and pull tight to create clean slices.

Enjoy!