Now, I love cinnamon as much as anyone. However, I find it to be a very fall/winter sort of flavour. For the first long weekend of the summer here in Canada (Victoria Day!) I knew I wanted to do something citrus-based, but wasn’t sure exactly how. So off Rich and I went to the grocery store to pick up the dough ingredients, along with a good sized bag of mandarin oranges and lemons. While putting these together, I decided to toss in some walnuts and dates that I already had, and voilà, these were born.

As they were baking, I was a bit disappointed in how they were turning out. When you bake cinnamon buns, the whole house fills with the amazing scent of cinnamon and other spices, but these buns did not have the same effect; I could detect a hint of orange if I stood near the oven, but that was about it. Fortunately, the real test is the taste test, and these were fantastic. The blend of citrus and sugar, of sour and sweet, of tender dough and gooey icing. I think I almost like them better than the original. Serve them after dinner with coffee, or for breakfast if you have a real sweet tooth. Or maybe both.

Orange Date Walnut Buns – Adapted from a Cinnamon Buns recipe

Dough:
3/4 cup cottage cheese (I used light ricotta instead)
1/3 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup granulated sugar
4 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla extract
Zest from 2 oranges
Juice from 1 orange
2.5 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp table salt
1/4 tsp baking soda

Filling:
1 1/2 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1/3 cup granulated sugar
Juice of 1/2 orange
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/3 cup chopped dates

Icing:
Juice of 1 orange
Zest of 1/2 orange
1 cup confectioners’ sugar (more if needed)

Heat oven to 400F. Grease sides of a 9 or 10 inch springform pan with cooking spray. If you don’t have a springform pan, don’t worry – a large, round cake pan or pie plate worked fine for me.

Make dough: In food processor, combine cottage/ricotta cheese, buttermilk, sugar, melted butter, and vanilla. Process until smooth, about 10 seconds. Add all remaining ingredients listed under dough and process in short pulse bursts until the dough just barely clumps together. Then remove the dough from the food processor and place onto a lightly floured surface. Knead until smooth (add in a little more flour if you need to), then roll out with a rolling pin to approximately a 12″X15″ rectangle.

Make filling: Brush the dough with melted butter, leaving a 1/2 inch un-buttered border around the edges of the dough. Sprinkle with sugar, then the juice. Cover with the walnuts and dates.

To roll up: starting at the long edge, roll the dough into a long ‘log’, the same as you’d do if making a jelly-roll. Pinch to seal the seam, but leave the ends open. Cut dough into 12 equal pieces with a sharp knife, and place into your greased pan. It is fine if the buns touch, but don’t worry if there are spaces between them; they will rise and spread as they bake.

Bake for 20-28 minutes until golden brown and firm to touch. Allow to cool for 5 minutes, then run a spatula around the outside edge of the buns to release them, and remove the outside of the springform pan. Allow to cool completely before icing. At this point you and your family may test a bun or two, to make sure they are indeed tasty. Rich and I did exactly that. It’s for the greater good, you know.

Icing: Mix well all ingredients listed under icing. You should get a smooth, thick, but pourable icing. If you find it is too thick, add a little more juice (1/2 Tbsp at a time). If you find it is too thin, add a touch more confectioners’ sugar. Pour over the buns and then serve immediately.

So what’s up with the Sugar High Friday image? Well, I’ve been following Sugar High Friday, a concept started by Jennifer of The Domestic Goddess, for about a year now. The idea is simple: Every month, bloggers from around the globe make a dessert based on a theme ingredient or concept. The last Friday of the month, the host blog posts a ’round up’ of the entries, so you can see what desserts everyone came up with, and of course nab some of the recipes for yourself! Anyhow, every so often I think I might want to try participating, but then suddenly it is the end of the month and I’ve missed out again. This month, with the theme being citrus (and hosted by Tartelette), I decided I just had to participate, providing my citrus buns actually turned out delicious. I’ll be watching Tartelette’s blog next Friday to see what other desserts people made!

For the first time in years, I decided to bake my own hot cross buns. Baking bread has long been a challenge for me, and I have to say this recipe was very easy to make and turned out fantastically.

At first I thought I might make some other design on top of the buns. The cross, of course, is meant to symbolize the crucifixion. But neither Rich or I are Christian, so it seemed more appropriate for me to draw some other sort of design. However, when it came time to do that, I realized the sticky, paste-like dough was not easy to draw with. So in the end, crosses are what I made, since it’s easy to draw straight lines. Maybe next time I’ll try drawing a flower or something.

I got my recipe from a post I saw on Tastespotting. I modified it slightly, so my modifications are noted here. Also, the original recipe calls for using a scale and measuring most of your ingredients by weight. I recommend doing this if you want to use this recipe.  Baking can be finicky and converting all of this to volume (cups, etc) may not produce the same results.

Hot Cross Buns

14g dry active yeast
500g white flour for bread, plus more for dusting
3 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons ground mixed spices. (I used approximately 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon of ginger, 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg, 1/2 teaspoon of allspice).
40g butter
200g raisins

Pastry for the crosses:
30g flour
1/4 teaspoon sugar

For the glaze:
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons water

Prepare a baking sheet by lightly greasing it.

In a small bowl mix the yeast, 2 teaspoons flour, 1 teaspoon sugar and 125 ml luke warm water. Cover with a with a damp cloth and place a in warm place for about 10 minutes. This will activate your yeast. After 10 minutes you should have a frothy, bubbly mixture. If not, your yeast is probably too old. Try again with fresher yeast.

In a large bowl, sift together your flour and spices, then mix in the sugar. Cut the butter into small pieces and add it in, mixing well with your fingertips, until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add in the raisins and then pour in the yeast mixture and 185ml extra water. Mix the dough by hand, and then knead it gently until it all comes together. The dough should easily leave the sides of the bowl.

Dust a countertop with some flour and put your dough on top. Knead it for 5 minutes or so, just until the dough is nice and smooth. If you need to add a bit more flour to combat stickiness, feel free, but only add it in small amounts at a time. Once the dough is smooth, shape it into a ball and toss it into a lightly floured bowl. Cover with a damp towel and put into a warm place to rise until doubled in volume (approximately 30-40 minutes). Hint: I heat my oven up very slightly, so you can just barely feel the warmth. I then shut off the oven and put my dough in there to rise. If you have a drafty kitchen, this really helps make sure your dough has a warm place!

Once your dough has risen, put it back onto your floured countertop and knead it again until smooth. Divide it into 12 equal parts, then roll each portion into a ball and place it on the greased baking tray, making sure the balls are all touching each other (see picture). Cover the tray with a damp cloth and allow to rest in a warm place for another 20 minutes. The balls of dough will double in volume again.

Preheat the oven to 200C (almost 400F).

For the crosses, mix the flour, sugar and 2 1/2 tablespoons of water into a thick but smooth paste-like mixture. Put into a piping bag or a small sandwich bag with a slight cut at one of the corners. Pipe crosses onto your buns, or, if you are handier than I am with pastry and want to be creative, make some sort of design instead.

Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown. Your crosses should still be fairly white, however.

To glaze the buns, mix together the sugar and water over low heat, just until the sugar is melted. With a pastry brush, brush over the buns while they are still warm.

Allow to cool a bit, then eat!

Happy Easter to those of you who celebrate, and Happy Spring to those who don’t!