MUST TRY Dubai Chocolate Hot Cross Buns

Recipe: Pistachio Hot Cross Buns Recipe »

Love Dubai Chocolate? It's almost Easter time and that means it's time for pistachio Hot Cross Buns! Try these incredibly soft and light Hot Cross Buns filled with PistachioCream and Nutella for Easter. They're based on my cult hot cross bun recipe using tangzhong roux to make them super soft and downy. These will taste as fresher and soft as a bakery hot cross buns (many say these are even better!). This is a pushy recipe Dear Reader.

If you've tried and enjoyed my bakery style hot cross buns but you want to try something a bit different, then give these Pistachio Cream and Nutella filled ones a try. These are based on the Dubai chocolate that combines chocolate and pistachios. Since that original hot cross bun recipe came out in 2016 (wow almost 10 years ago) I've received so many lovely messsages around Easter. Since then I've also refined the recipe a little. And I promise this one tiny step of making a flour and water roux called tangzhong makes the world of difference with ensuring that your bread is super downy soft and stays that way.

Tips For Making Pistachio Hot Cross Buns

1 - Tangzhong is a Chinese term and technique for making super soft bread. You know how Asian bakeries have really soft bread? That's thanks to tangzhong. It's made by whisking flour and water and then gently heating it up. That's it! And adding just this roux to your flour makes the world of difference with creating buns.

2 - I always weigh the dough to ensure that the buns are the same size. Take time to shape them into balls without any cracks. To do this, cup the dough around the edge and form a ball. Then roll the dough balls on an unfloured surface so that they stick ever so slightly. Use both hands to roll and slightly move the buns each time so that the cracks on the bottom get buffed out.

3 - Once the buns are baked, you poke a hole in the base or side with the larger end of a chopstick and then pipe in some Nutella and Pistachio cream. You can fill them with just Nutella or pistachio cream. You can also fill them with some toasted kataifi and pistachio cream mixed together!

4 - I use Pisti pitachio cream spread as it is a sweet pistachio cream. Sometimes you can get pesto but that's savoury and not what you want for this recipe.

Pistachio Hot Cross Buns

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Preparation time: 40 minutes plus 1 hour 15 minutes rising time

Cooking time: 35 minutes

• 600g/21ozs plain all purpose or bread flour + 25g/1oz
• 1/2 cup/125ml/4flozs water
• 1 cup/20ml/8.8flozs milk
• A few drops green food colouring
• 1/4 cup/80g/2.8ozs honey
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon instant dried yeast
• 1.5 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon mixed spice
• 60g/2ozs butter, cubes, softened

Flour crosses

• 40g/1.41ozs. plain flour
• Around 3 tablespoons water to make paste

For Glaze

• 1/8 cup sugar
• 1/8 cup boiling water
• 1/2 teaspoon gelatine powder

For Filling

• 1 cup pistachio cream
• 1 cup Nutella

Step 1 - Make the tangzhong or water roux. Please don't let this step put you off. It makes a huge difference for the softest of buns. Take the 25g/1oz of flour and whisk with 1/2 cup of water in a saucepan until smooth. Heat on medium heat and stir until it thickens to become a roux. You want it to reach 65ºC/149ºF and it will take about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and add the milk in two lots and the honey and whisk until the honey melts. Whisk in the eggs, salt and green food colouring.

Step 2 - Place the 600g/21oz flour, yeast, cinnamon, nutmeg and mixed spice in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook and whisk to combine.

Step 3 - Add the tangzhong mixture to the flour mix and knead until elastic. Add a bit more flour if the mixture is too wet. Finally add the butter cubes one at a time. It needs to be elastic and stretchy but not break. You should be able to pull it apart between your fingers and see through it without it breaking. Roll it into a ball making sure that there are no cracks on top of the ball and allow it to rise in a warm place til triple its size. This can take 40-60 minutes.

Step 4 - Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. Mix the cross ingredients together to make a pipeable paste and place in a small piping bag cutting a small hole at the end.

Troubleshooting: your dough will be sticky but try not to add too much flour. A little is fine because flour varies from supplier to batch but adding too much will affect the texture of the buns. Instead, add a little flour and then lightly oil your hands just before shaping them.

Step 5 - Line a baking tray with high sides with parchment. Punch down the dough. Flour your hands and a surface and shape 12 buns around 100g/3.5ozs each (I weighed the dough just to keep it consistent). Place on the parchment and do not give these a long rise, as long as they puff up a bit that is perfect. Pipe crosses on top and then bake for 30 minutes.

Step 5 - To make the glaze, whisk the sugar, boiling water and gelatine until smooth and brush over the hot buns. If you don't have gelatine, you can glaze these with some warmed up apricot jam. Serve with butter.

• Other Hot Cross Bun Recipes You Might Like
• Triple CHOCOLATE Hot Cross Buns
• Hot Cross Bun Loaf
• Nutella Swirl Hot Cross Buns
• Gluten Free Hot Cross Buns
• Honey Butter Hot Cross Buns
• Savoury Bacon, Cheese & Egg Hot Cross Buns

I made these hot cross buns the other day a few weeks before Easter because if you can't celebrate the year's best and longest long weekend ever with an onslaught of hot cross buns every morning for breakfast, then what is life all about? ;)

I also made these Dubai chocolate hot cross buns on the day of my mother's birthday. Long time readers will know that my parents moved to Singapore a few years ago and they live with my sister there.

I wished her a happy birthday and she explained her plans for her birthday. They were going to the Ritz Carlton for a lunch but it was her plans for dinner that really made me chuckle. They had found a restaurant where if you order 4 serves of noodles you can have as many dumplings as your birthday age. Later that day she sent me a photo of herself with 3 platters of dumplings! And neither my father or my sister were going to help her eat them so I think she is celebrating her birthday with a onslaught of dumplings!

So tell me Dear Reader, do you like hot cross buns? What food would you like an onslaught of?