Made in Chelsea

Part two of my Sunday afternoon project was to cook some Chelsea Buns as a sweet postscript to the Tomato, Aubergine and Kidney Bean Pie I made earlier. I wasn't expecting the buns to take nearly as long as they did to prepare but the end result justified the long drawn out means.

The first step is to make the dough and according to the recipe I'd laid my hands on this involves sticking 900 grams of white bread flour into your mixing bowl and then dropping about 75 grams of caster sugar in with it through a sieve. Unfortunately my sieve wasn't quite the right size for all the bread flour so it ended up being dumped into the bowl in one big mass. I also dropped in 175 grams of butter cut into pieces.

 Meanwhile I cracked open two eggs and beat them hard with a whisk in a separate bowl before adding them to flour and sugar. The next step involved getting the water in the kettle to my own body temperature (37 degrees) and pouring 400ml of it into the bowl with the other ingredients. After this I dropped a sachet of yeast (about 50 grams) into the mix. Now for the tough bit.

I got my favourite metal table spoon from the kitchen drawer and started to mix the ingredients together. This wasn't an easy task and the trick was to spread the water and egg evenly over the vast amount of flour, sugar and butter. Gradually the ingredients started to stick together (as well as stick to my spoon) until they formed a thick wet mass of dough which stuck to the bowl like industrial strength glue. There is always a way out. In this case it is to add a bit more bread flour into dough to toughen it up a bit. Having done this it's then time to give the dough a good kneading by sticking your fists through it like Mike Tyson working over Frank Bruno- just make sure you don't break your bowl! Other ways to knead the dough include grabbing it with one hand and slamming it hard onto the work surface. The trick in doing this is to beat the air out of the dough prior to cooking it. Once the dough is soft but not sticky enough to leave pieces attached to the bowl or work surface put it back in the bowl and leave it to rise for about 15 minutes.

After having a short sit down and a cup of green tea to get my energy back from kneading the dough  (better and cheaper exercise than joining a gym) it was time to tackle the easy part, making the filling. I first weighed out 50 grams of butter and then rolled out the dough into a long rectangle on the work surface. The best way to roll your dough is to put plenty of flour on the work surface and on your rolling pin to make sure the dough doesn't stick to anything.

I then got the butter and spread it over the top of the dough as if making a gigantic sandwich and then weighed out about 100 grams of sultanas and a further 100 grams of mixed peel left over from Christmas. Will the festive season never end!? I only finished eating the Christmas Cake in mid-January. To give dough even more sweetness I sprinkled a teaspoon of Cinnamon over the sultanas and the peel. At this point I balanced out the sweetness by taking a whole lemon and grating the majority of its zest onto the dough.

The recipe gets a bit tedious at this point as the dough needs rolling into a sausage shape without dis-guarding the fruit, cinnamon and the rest of the filling all over the kitchen. The trick is to keep turning the dough as if you are wringing out water from a towel or a flannel. After this slice the dough into pieces (probably about twelve for dough of this size) and if any of the filling falls out of the mixture stuff it back in so it can be used in the next piece of dough you cut.

When I finally finished cutting the buns I put them on foil that I'd previously greased thoroughly with margarine and cooked them in the oven at 210 degrees if (like me) you have a fan oven otherwise do them at 220 degrees. The buns should be in for no more than fifteen minutes as I found that some of the smaller buns were starting to burn and the loose sultanas were crunchy when eaten.

The Verdict

This isn't an easy recipe as the dough is a real challenge and it is frustrating trying to keep the filling in when you are cutting your buns out of the dough before cooking them. However it is worth it as the dough mixed with the cinnamon sugar and fruit makes a tasty combination which is extremely filling. I defy anyone to eat more than two of these substantial buns in one sitting. The food is also good comfort food to make at this time of year when Christmas is behind you and Spring is still a long way away.