Sláinte!

Hot Cross Buns and a glass of Irish Stout

I said that I was finished with Hot Cross Buns, but then Dan Lepard's recipe came along to tempt me.  Soaking the fruit in hot black tea . . . and fermenting the sponge in Irish stout . . .  could there be a better way of celebrating the Irish and the Lenten season? 

My daughter says this is the best batch yet:  lots of fruit and a rich malty flavor.  Is it just my imagination, or does stout have a chocolate bouquet?  Maybe not, but the smell in my kitchen was incredible.

Ingredients:

325 ml Irish stout

1 1/2 tsp each of ground ginger, cinnamon and mace (or mixed spice)

1 1/2 tsp dry instant yeast

875 g strong white four

325 g raisins (or currants and sultanas)

175 g mixed peel, or finely chopped dried apricots

250 ml hot black tea

1 large egg

50 g melted butter

50 g caster sugar

1/1/2 tsp salt

Method:

The night before, mix the stout, spices, yeast and 325 g flour in a deep bowl.  Put the raisins, peel and tea in another bowl.  (Cover both bowls with cling film.)

Next day, mix the egg and butter with the fruit, then stir into the beer and spice batter.

Mix in 550g flour, the sugar and salt, and leave for 10 minutes.

Lightly oil your hands and patch of worktop or cutting board.

Knead the dough for 10 seconds, leave for 10 minutes, repeat twice more at 10-minute intervals, and then leave for an hour.  If the dough is too sticky, lightly flour the surface of it as you knead.

Divide the dough into 100 g pieces, shape into balls and place, touching, on a tray lined with nonstick paper.  Leave for 90 minutes.

Mix a couple of tablespoons of flour, a tablespoon of caster sugar and enough water to make a pourably thick paste.  Pipe crosses on each ball. 

Bake at 200C/400F for approximately 25 minutes.

While the buns are still hot, brush with a glaze made from a tablespoon each of caster sugar and boiling water.

To your health!

a pale green tulip for St. Patrick's Day

Hot Cross Buns

For some inexplicable reason, (but I will attribute it to the unseasonably cold weather), I have become obsessed with hot cross buns this spring. I’m on a quest for the perfect recipe, and it’s already been quite the long process. After my fourth batch, my oldest daughter warned me that I’m in danger of permanently burning her out, so perhaps this should be my last batch – until the next Easter season, of course.

I’ve decided that this is my year to try my hand at baked goods I’ve never experimented with before. Actually, I’ve meant to make hot cross buns for several years now, but it has long been our tradition to spend Easter in Texas, and invariably I will forget about hot cross buns until Easter is long-gone. Of course, I could make hot cross buns in May . . . but if you are going to make a seasonal specialty, it does seem more meaningful to abide by the imposed timeline.

As my years in England increase, I’ve noticed that my baking habits are skewing towards British traditions. There is ancient historical precedence for having hot cross buns at Easter – to the extent that Queen Elizabeth I had to pass a law limiting their production to the Christmas and Easter season. (Apparently they had a dangerous association with Catholicism, but we won’t get into that.) Anyway, that law must have been repealed a long time ago because now you can find hot cross buns on the shelves of any grocery store year-round.

When I was looking for a recipe, I checked Baking with Julia first – and was hugely surprised to discover that this authoritative tome had neglected in include hot cross buns in their offerings. The Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Baking book didn’t have a recipe for them, either. I did manage to find a rather simple recipe in my 1953 edition of Better Homes and Gardens, but I was a bit dubious about it. Adding some currants and a bit of cinnamon to plain roll dough wasn’t really what I was looking for . . . because surely there is more to it than that? From this sampling of American cookbooks, I think that we can infer that hot cross buns are not really part of the American baking canon. I did find a recipe in the King Arthur Whole Grains cookbook – but after trying it, I couldn’t wholeheartedly recommend it.

The first batch of hot cross buns I made came from a most beloved cookbook: Jane Brocket’s Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer. If you are a fan of English storybooks and/or the traditions of English teatime, this book is a must-have. Jane cites Dan Lepard, a well-known English baker, as the source of her recipe – and I did think it gave a good result. It makes a sturdy bun – slightly spicy, not too sweet. Like all yeast rolls, these buns are best straight out of the oven. As soon as they cool, I freeze what we aren’t going to eat right away. A brief defrost, and then a 20 to 30 second zap in the microwave, will approximate the just-out-of-oven goodness. This batch served as breakfast for a week.

The one drawback of the Jane Brocket recipe is the overall time it takes. Brocket wants three different risings (I don’t mean to sound Biblical here): one for the sponge, one for the dough, and another for the shaped rolls. She mentions having these buns for “elevenses,” but I would have to stay up all night if I wanted to serve them any time before noon. At this time of the year our house is extremely cold. Even when I put my buns in the “hottest part of the house,” the airing cupboard, I still needed to double the amount of time required to get a good rise out of my dough.

Moving on to the next step in my hot cross bun journey: Nigella. I was surprised (again!) to discover that Nigella Lawson didn’t include a recipe for hot cross buns in her baking book: How to be a Domestic Goddess. Surely, surely, a domestic goddess makes her own hot cross buns? She does remedy this oversight in a later cookbook: Feast. I had thought that Nigella’s hot cross bun would prove to the favourite, and thus final batch, of the hot cross buns . . . but sadly, no. Despite a promisingly fragrant beginning, where you steep clove and cardamom in hot milk, her buns were oddly flat and tasteless. I actually did wonder if there were mistakes in the recipe – which does not call for sugar or salt! Nigella gets all fancy with the finishing touches: an egg wash, plus the flour/sugar crosses, plus a sugar glaze. Unfortunately, her buns were as hard as rocks the next day. She bakes them in a very hot oven, unlike the other recipes that I followed, and although they are beautifully burnished they just don’t hold up well.

Even with the favourite of the three recipes I tried, the one from Jane Brocket, I wanted a hot cross bun that was more meltingly tender. Finally, on my fourth go, I improvised.  Hey, I do the experimenting so you don't have to.  One batch of hot cross buns per Good Friday is probably enough.

Bee’s Hot Cross Buns

Ingredients:

2/3 cup milk
½ cup butter (4 ounces or one stick)
½ cup to 2/3 cup of sugar (depending on your sweet tooth)
zest of an orange and a lemon
1 package active dry yeast*
1 cup mixed dried fruit (raisins, currants, sultanas)
2 teaspoons mixed spice (or a combination of cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger if you don’t have this)
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
4 ½ to 5 cups of white bread flour

Method:

Just to be on the safe side, you may want to proof your yeast in a ¼ cup warm water and a teaspoon of sugar. You shouldn’t need to this with active yeast, but I got a better result when I did. * Next time I try this recipe I'm going to go with two packages of yeast, but I can't vouch for the end-result as I haven't tried it yet.

Then melt the butter into the milk over very low heat. While it was melting, I scraped off the zest from an orange and a lemon and threw it in the saucepan. When the mixture has cooled, and is only slightly warm, beat two eggs into it.

As the milk mixture is cooling, add the other ingredients into a large mixing bowl : 4 ½ cups of flour, the spices, the sugar, the salt and the dried fruit. Pour the liquid ingredients over the top and mix until well-incorporated. You may have to add a bit more flour – or conversely a bit more milk. The gluten in flour varies quite a lot and you need to go by feel. You want a soft dough that holds together, although it won’t make a ball shape; it shouldn’t be sticky, nor should it be dry. After being kneaded, it should feel silky. I kneaded it with my dough hook for about five minutes, without ever taking it out of my mixing bowl, but it is easy enough to do by hand. This kind of dough doesn’t need as much kneading as bread.

Lightly oil (or butter) your bowl and the top of your ball of dough. Cover with a damp tea towel and put in a warm place.* (The only warm place in my house is the airing cupboard.) It should rise until nearly doubled; this may take an hour, or it may take three hours. After your dough has risen, punch it down. (Please see the picture sequence.)

After the first rising, you will shape the dough into balls – approximately 3 ounces each – and place on a greased baking sheet. They should be “snug,” as Nigella says, but not touching. After they bake they will be touching, but you should be able to easily pull them apart. With a knife, score each bun with a cross. (If you wait to do this, you will press down too much on the dough after it has risen.) Cover your baking sheet with a tea towel and put the buns in a warm place for their second rising. Again, some recipes claim that this will happen in 45 minutes . . . but I found that two hours (or about the length of my yoga class, plus the drive back and forth) was just about right.

Before baking, you will have to do the last step: filling in the crosses. Without the crosses you’ve got nothing but spiced buns.

Make a paste of 3 tablespoons of flour, a tablespoon of sugar and approximately 2 tablespoons of water (maybe more). It should be smooth, thick, but not too thick. You can then pipe, syringe or merely ladle the paste into the indents of the cross.

my left-handed daughter demonstrates her technique

Bake for 25-30 minutes in a moderately high oven. 180C/375F. They should be golden brown, but be careful – the browner they get, the harder. Err on the light side of things.

Finally, when the buns are still warm, remove to a rack and glaze. If you boil a tablespoon of water with the same of sugar it will make a simple glaze to brush over the top. If you want something sweeter, you can make a simple frosting of icing sugar and milk.

It is not necessary to drink a cup of tea with a hot cross bun . . . but it is advisable.


The best way to reheat rolls is to place them in a plain paper bag, sprinkle the bag lightly with water, and place in a hot oven 3 to 5 minutes before serving.  (from the 1953 edition of "The Red Plaid Cookbook.")

Cream tea

Years ago, my parents and I travelled through the Cotswolds.  When my father received his credit card bill,, he marvelled that we could have spent so many pounds (in weight and money) on tea and scones.  When in England . . .

Really, is there anything more quintessentially English than a cream tea?

Last week, I went to The Ritz to celebrate a dear friend's 50th birthday.  The Ritz is famous for their afternoon tea; so much so that you have to book, sometimes months ahead, for a reservation.  The colors are all cream and gold, and they bring everyone an individual silver tea service -- with a tiered tower of treats to share.  On the ground level are the sandwiches:  smoked salmon, egg mayonnaise, ham and cheese.  On the top level are the little pastries and chocolate cake.  But the true centerpiece of the ritual is the plate of scones, with the obligatory china pots of clotted cream and jam on the side.

Americans and Brits have both been known to ask:  What is the difference between a biscuit and a scone?  And although I've tried many recipes going under each of these titles, I don't think there is an answer to this question . . . precisely because there is no definitive recipe for either the biscuit or the scone.  Really, it's just a matter of language. The essential ingredients are flour, butter/shortening, sugar and a leavening agent -- but the liquid ingredient might be buttermilk, whole milk or cream.  The amount of sugar can vary a lot, and as a general rule I would say that scones have more sugar than biscuits -- but I've eaten exceptions to that rule, too.  Both biscuits and scones can be cut into rounds, or they can be dropped by a spoon or cut into triangles.

Ritz scones are cut into rounds, and they have what I suspect is an egg glazed top.  They are soft, even slightly doughy, with a fine crumb -- and dense, but not heavy.   I would have asked for the recipe, but I couldn't get up the nerve.  This is the sort of place that won't even give you a doggie bag, and I DID ask for that.  The birthday girl had to secret away the left-over scones in a napkin and take them home in her handbag.  We had to leave behind, with some regret, the pastries that we couldn't manage.  They just weren't hardy enough for handbag transportation.

I have never been able to duplicate the Ritz sort of scone at home, no matter how many recipes I've tried.
For home use, though, I am fond of a recipe that is attributed to Claridge's -- one of the other famous places to take tea in London.  It is a more rustic kind of scone, but also very delicious.  It lends itself well to add-ins; so while raisins or currants are traditional, you can feel free to add nuts, dried berries or cherries, candied ginger, the zest of an orange or lemon or any other thing that you fancy.

Scones
(from Tea and Crumpets, by Margaret M. Johnson)

3 cups self-rising flour
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup (6 ounces) butter, cold and cut into small pieces
1 cup buttermilk
1 large egg, beaten
1/2 cup raisins
optional: sugar crystals or demerara sugar for the tops

Preheat the oven to 350F/175 C.  Prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silpat.

Combine the flour and sugar in a food processor.  Add the butter, and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.  (You can do this by hand, or with a pastry cutter -- but the food processor is faster.)
Transfer the mixture to a large bowl, and stir in the buttermilk and egg with a wooden spoon until you have a soft ball of dough.  You may need to add slightly more liquid, but try to handle the mixture as lightly as possible.  Knead in the raisins.
 
Divide the dough in half and form each half into a ball.  Press each ball down until it is a round disk about 1 inch thick.  Then use a serrated knife to cut into wedges -- six or eight, depending on how big you want your scones to be.  Sprinkle the tops with sugar.
Bake for 25 to 30 minutes.
These will sprawl out a bit, so don't place them too close together on the baking sheet.

Let them cool for about 10 minutes -- but the sooner they are served, the more tender they will be.  (Having said that, I heated up one of the left-overs in the microwave this morning and it was still pretty darn good.)

Now the really critical bit -- and here's where the real line between scones and biscuits is drawn.
While American biscuits might be dressed up by butter, honey, jelly or even gravy, an English cream tea calls for the following critical ingredient: clotted cream.  If you've never had clotted cream, I can only attempt to describe it -- really, there's nothing else like it.  It is thick enough to cling to an upside-down spoon, silky in texture and slightly yellow -- the color of, well, cream.  Apparently it is made by simmering cow's milk until a thick layer of cream can be skimmed off the top.  It has to be a certain kind of cow, though -- typically a Jersey or Guernsey who has been grazing on grass and clover year-round.

Believe it or not, there are two "methods" for garnishing your scone:  Devonshire and Cornish.  For the Devonshire method, which I have long subscribed to without ever realizing that it had a proper name, you split your scone in half and then cover each half with a layer of cream and then a topping of jam.  The Cornish method is slightly more fat-soaked:  first a thick swipe of butter, then the jam, with the clotted cream on top. 

And one more thing about scones:  even in the pronunciation they are controversial.  Americans (and some Brits) say scone in a way that follows typical phonetic rules for pronunciation:  scone, with a long o.  Many English people will scoff at this pronunciation, though.  They prefer to call this tea-time delicacy a sc-ah-n.

Another novelty is the tea party,

an extraordinary meal in that, being offered

to persons that have already dined well,

it supposed neither appetite nor thirst,

and no object but distraction,

no basis but delicate enjoyment.

Brillat-Savarin 

christmas favorites: teacakes and a tea ring

first i have to say that we are in the darkest time of the year here in denmark and that means that on the best of days, there's only good light between about 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. by 2:30, there's already a sunset quality to the light. most days are dark, overcast and very grey and it rains a lot and we don't see the sunshine for weeks on end. i'm explaining this for several reasons. one, it means my pictures all have the very golden cast of the artificial light combined with the yellow walls of my kitchen. and two, it means we take cover in the house, baking. especially here in the lead up to the holidays. this weekend, we baked two family holiday favorites and we will bake them again before the season is over.

the first is a holiday tea ring in a pretty wreath-shape that my mom always makes. the recipe makes two, one to keep and one to give away.  it has festive candied cherries on top and is a delicious, slightly-sweet bread. it makes a good breakfast if you have any left the next morning, just slather on a bit of butter and drink with a steaming mug of tea (or coffee).

holiday tea ring

1/2 C butter

1 C milk

melt the butter and add the milk, heating it til it's rather lukewarm (you don't want it too hot or it will kill your yeast)

4.5-5 C flour

1/2 C sugar

1 tsp. salt

1 package fresh yeast (or two packages dry yeast)

2 eggs

handful of raisins

halved candied cherries

pecans (if desired)

sugar

cinnamon

butter

put the yeast and the sugar down in your mixing bowl and when the milk/butter mixture is warm, add it to the yeast. allow it to dissolve and begin to work, add the eggs. begin adding the flour, one cup at a time. mix it well. if you use your kitchen aid, let the dough hook do the work, if not, you will need to knead the dough for about 5 minutes, then place it in a large, lightly-greased, floured bowl to rise until it's double in size.

when it's doubled in size, divide it in half and roll it out into two rectangles that are approximately 18" x 7" (according to my mom's instructions), spread it with butter down the middle, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar (to taste) - we put quite a lot, then add a handful of raisins, pecans and cherries down the middle. since there is a little girl at our house that loves the cherries, but not raisins or nuts, we put only cherries in ours. it's really up to you. you could also put in other dried fruits - melon, apple, papaya, cranberries - whatever you like.

join the two ends so that it forms a wreath shape and transfer to a baking tray lined with baking paper. use a scissors to clip 2/3 of the way in (that's not what i did in the picture - i did it wrong and only remembered how to do it correctly afterwards) every inch and a half or so. then take every other one of those, pull it up and twist it to make the wreath look more wreath-like. allow it to rise half an hour or so in a warm place, brush with an egg/water wash (if desired) then bake at 175℃/350℉ for 20-25 minutes (my oven seems faster than others, so you may need more time than this).

make up an easy powdered sugar frosting and drizzle it over, decorating with cherries.

frosting

1 C powdered sugar

2 tsp. milk

dash of vanilla

i advise diving in while it's still warm. be sure to make a fresh pot of christmas tea to go with it.

the other favorite we made this weekend were my grandmother's russian teacakes. they're so easy, not too sweet (which makes them perfect in my book)

russian teacakes

1 C. butter
½ C. powdered sugar
¼ t. salt
1 t. vanilla
2 ¼ C. flour
¾ C. finely ground pecans (or walnuts if, like me, you can't find pecans anywhere this year)

bake 200℃/400℉ 8-10 minutes. they do not need to be brown, but are quite pale. make 3 doz. balls. grandma always mashed them criss-crossed with a fork. when cooled, roll the cookies in sifted powdered sugar. try not to eat them all the first day.

Making mincemeat

Okay, friends:  it is time to start soaking your fruit.

I know that we've just packed away the Halloween costumes, and that many of you are thinking in terms of Thanksgiving menus, but it is only six weeks until Christmas . . . and making your own mincemeat is a really satisfying (even relaxing!) way to prepare for the holiday of all holidays.  It is easy, too; all you need is a big pot and a wooden spoon.

Mince pies are ubiquitous in England during the Christmas season. So much so, in fact, that the original delicacy is in danger of being debased.  People get so used to the cheap boxes of pre-made mince pies that they forget how utterly delicious the homemade version is by comparison.  When done right, commonplace things are ambrosial.

There is something about a homemade mince pie, with its meltingly soft pastry and mouthful of rich fruit, that makes me think of all of the coziest Christmas associations:  snow on the outside when you are on the inside, roaring fires, favorite carols, candles in the window, dark nights, a glittering tree, visiting loved ones. 
 

I do realize that not everyone likes dried fruit, or the Christmasy treats made with them.  (I think that I used to be one of these people, actually, but no longer!)  I grew up with baking traditions that revolved around cookies and candy, but in England you've got the holy trinity of dried fruit:  Christmas pudding, Christmas cake and mince pies.  Although I haven't abandoned the sugar cookies, the gingerbread men, the toffee or the peanut brittle from my childhood, all of these years in England have added their own cultural accretions.  Really, I couldn't contemplate Christmas without mince pies.

A few years ago I started making my own mincemeat -- a misnomer, really, as no one puts meat into their mixture these days.  Every year I try a new recipe, and I've had good results with both suet and butter.  I've added apricots, candied ginger and pear in place of the usual apple, but this year I was in the mood for something more classic. This recipe comes from Mary Berry's Christmas Collection.  (Was there ever a better name for a Christmas cookery writer?)  It is a very traditional recipe -- and I'm going to give it to you straight, just in case there are some mince pie neophytes out there who want to give it a go. 

Having said that, I made several alterations to this blueprint:  namely, I left out the apple, substituted pecans for the almonds, slightly reduced the mixed peel, and doubled the quantities of everything.  I made one batch with rum, and one with sherry.  I really fancy the idea of mixing in the rum-soaked fruit to some vanilla ice cream and making a Christmas version of one of my favorites:  rum-and-raisin ice cream.

I had planned on giving some of the jars as gifts, but I can't promise that I will follow through.  Last year, I had several jars from the previous year's canning sessions.  I gave one to a friend, and when I tasted how absolutely delicious this vintage blend was I was sadly tempted to ask for it back! 

We should probably make mincemeat in July, but who wants to think of Christmas then?  You need a cold, dank November day to really get into the spirit of boozy soaked fruit.

Special mincemeat

Ingredients:

175g (6 oz) currants

175g (6 oz) raisins

175g (6 oz) sultanas

175g (6 oz) dried cranberries

100g (4 oz) mixed peel

1 small cooking apple, peeled, cored and finely diced

125g (4 oz) butter, cut into small pieces* (you could also use the traditional suet here)

50g (2 oz) whole blanched almonds, roughly chopped

225g (8 oz) light brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon mixed spice

finely grated rind and juice of 1 lemon

200ml (7 fl oz) brandy, rum or sherry

Method:

Measure all of the ingredients into a large saucepan -- EXCEPT for the alcohol.

Heat gently until the butter has all melted, and then simmer over low heat for 10 minutes.  Stir occasionally to evenly distribute all of the ingredients.

Allow the mixture to cool completely, and then stir in the alcohol of your choice.

Sterilize your canning jars -- I tend to do this in the dishwasher, and then dry them out well in a low oven.  Spoon the cool mixture into the jars and seal tightly.  The longer you leave them, the better.

If stored in a cool place, they should last well for months . . . and maybe even until next Christmas!