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Hot Cross Buns
(England.) These are made on Good Friday. Rub 1/4 pound butter with 2 pounds flour, a tablespoonful of yeast, and 1 1/2 pints warm milk. Let it rise 2 hours, add 1/2 pound sugar, 1/2 pound currants, and 1/2 a grated nutmeg. Knead into a dough and form into buns, set these in a pan, cut a cross on top of each, brush with butter, and let stand for 15 minutes near the fire. Bake for 3/4 hour in good oven.
A plain nineteenth-century enriched dough, given in weights and with an oven described only as "good." Two numbers need attention before you start: the milk and the baking time.
- The bake time is the thing to changeThree-quarters of an hour will produce dry, hard buns. Individual buns of 2 to 3 oz bake in 15 to 20 minutes at 400F. The 45 minutes suggests either much larger buns than we would make, or a slacker oven than a modern one.
- "Good oven" means about 400F"Good oven" is usually read as roughly 400-425F, though period oven terms were never precise. Bake until the tops are deep brown and a bun sounds hollow when tapped underneath.
- Weights into cups2 lb flour is about 7 cups; 1/4 lb butter is one stick; 1/2 lb sugar is a generous cup; 1/2 lb currants is about 1 1/2 cups. 1 1/2 pints of milk is 3 cups in US measure; if an imperial pint of 20 fl oz was meant, it is nearer 3 1/2 to 3 3/4 cups. The recipe does not tell us which, so start low.
- Hold back some milkEven at the lower reading this is a slack dough for buns, and the sugar added later loosens it further. Mix in two-thirds of the milk, then add the rest only as needed for a soft, kneadable dough.
- The yeastA tablespoonful of yeast means fresh compressed yeast or brewer's barm, not a modern dried product. Substitute about 2 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast, or one 0.6 oz cake of fresh yeast, for this quantity of flour.
- Sugar and fruit go in late for a reasonHeavy sugar slows yeast, so the first rise is done on the plain dough and the sugar and currants are worked in after the two hours. Then give the shaped buns a proper proof of 40 to 60 minutes in a warm room; the 15 minutes "near the fire" assumes a warmer spot than most modern kitchens offer.
- The crossHere it is cut with a knife, which tends to close up as the buns rise. A piped paste of flour and water, or a cross laid on in strips of dough, holds its shape better.
- NutmegHalf a grated nutmeg across 2 lb of flour is about 1 to 1 1/2 teaspoons ground, which is assertive but correct for the style. Grate it fresh; pre-ground nutmeg loses most of its point within months.
- YieldRoughly 24 to 30 buns. They are best the day they are baked, and stale ones were traditionally split, toasted and buttered.
Hot cross buns are tied to Good Friday in England, where by the eighteenth century street criers sold them on the morning itself, and legislation and custom both worked to keep spiced buns as festival rather than everyday goods. The cross is generally read as the crucifixion, though marking bread with a cross is far older than any single explanation, and the frequently repeated claims about pagan origins or buns hung from kitchen rafters to ward off illness are traditional lore rather than documented fact. The recipe's appearance in a book of dishes gathered country by country is typical of its genre: a national dish is presented in shorthand, with the assumption that a reader in a household with a coal range and a working knowledge of yeast doughs will supply the rest. The currants, sugar and half a nutmeg mark it as a treat, since spices and dried fruit in that quantity still signalled a feast day.