You find the nicest recipes in the strangest places sometimes but they often can do with a bit of tweaking to make it original and turn it into something the family would love.

The recipe for these buns were posted here but I don’t know if it is because of the way I copied it or if it was missing in the original recipe but, while they mention the glaze and how to make the crosses for hot cross buns, the ingredients don’t show in what I copied. So, even though I don’t make these into Hot Cross buns, I will mention at the end of the post what to do to make the crosses and include the recipe for the glaze.

Sticky Spice Buns

Ingredients
500ml white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
500ml cake flour
2.5ml cinnamon

10g sachet instant yeast

5ml allspice
10ml fine salt
60ml castor sugar

125ml warm water
125ml warm milk
1 medium egg
50ml tablespoons butter

250ml fruit cake mix or a mix of raisins, currants, or golden raisins
Finely grated zest of half an orange

In a bowl, combine all the dry ingredients (flours, yeast, spices, salt & sugar). Add the egg, milk, water and butter and mix to a sticky dough. I find that using bread flour when using yeast helps a lot but if you only have cake flour just use that i.e. 1000ml cake flour.

Then, add the dried fruit, orange zest, and spices and knead until silky and smooth. Cover the dough and let rise in a warm place for about 1 hour, until doubled in size.

Deflate the risen dough and divide into 8 equal pieces. Shape into rounds and dust with flour. Place on a floured board, cover with plastic wrap or cloth, and let proof for about 30 minutes, until roughly doubled in size.

Preheat the oven to 200 °C. Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown and brush with glaze immediately after you have removed them from the oven.

For the sticky glaze

45ml smooth apricot jam/preserve

15ml water

Melt jam with water in a microwave safe bowl in the microwave for 3 minutes stirring at 1 minute intervals on in a small pot on the stove. Set aside to cool a bit while you wait for the buns to finish baking.

To turn these into Hot Cross buns you will need to make a “pastry” for the crosses:

250ml cake flour

30-45ml cold water

Whisk together flour and 30ml water until smooth adding a little more water if you need to, then transfer to a pastry bag and snip off the end to make a fine hole (or use a plastic food bag with a corner snipped off). It needs to come together in a dough that is thin enough to pipe but thick enough to hold its shape. Pipe a cross on top of each one before baking for 15 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, melt jam and water in a pan. Brush over the buns to glaze as you take them from the oven. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Serve hot, cross, or toasted.

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