I recently bought chocolate hot cross buns from the Daylesford Organic café on Pimlico Road. They were nice, but for my taste not chocolatey enough, so I thought I’d give it a go and make a version myself.
I based the recipe on Ciril Hitz’s basic sweet dough, but halved the amount of yeast, added a tablespoon of rye sourdough starter, and used a mix of stoneground spelt and strong white flour (about 80:20) . I also added 2 tablespoons cocoa powder, 60g chopped milk chocolate (I would have preferred dark chocolate and more of it, but this is all I had at home), a teaspoon each of ground all spice, cinnamon and cardamom, and rum soaked sultanas. After a two hour rise on the counter, I left the dough in the fridge overnight, then shaped the buns and let them rise for another two hours. After baking I mixed icing sugar with a little bit of lemon juice and piped on the crosses.
I’m happy with the result – light and fragrant buns, although next time I will increase the amount of chocolate and cocoa powder.
