Exhausting year-end and festive commitments can make cooking a chore at Christmas, so I often take a break from the kitchen during the holidays.
Easter, however, gives me time to reconnect with my kitchen and spend happy hours on cooking projects that I have had the headspace to plan.
Out of the freezer comes the sourdough starter. Seafood is sourced for Good Friday. A lamb dish can be lovingly prepared over three days. Traditionalist much?
There is also time for a yeasty bake. Yeast being something I have a love-hate relationship with - failed dough mixes clogging my rubbish bin and blowing my reduced kitchen waste efforts.
The first of three batches for these cinnamon buns was binned because I forgot to add the egg. The second because the room was too cool for the second rise. I cooked them anyway to see what would happen: inedible rock cakes.
Third time round wasn’t perfect either, I got distracted and left the dough rising in the bowl too long which also hindered the second rise. The cooked result wasn’t the pillowy bun of desire, but they were fluffy enough to scrape through.
These failures have demonstrated that I have been unfairly hating on yeast when, (if the yeast is in good condition), it’s the focus of the cook that affects the result.
Time and a clear mind should be included in the ingredient list for yeasty bakes. Pay attention to the temperature in your kitchen which can change radically throughout the process and, unless you have heating on, or are enjoying an Indian summer, will probably be too cool at the end of April in Otago.
I have a Gaggenau oven in my new kitchen, (and can justify bragging about it because I lived without an oven for seven years!) which has a dough-proofing function that now, gloriously, takes all the guess work out of this process. Do it if you can.
Being as liberal as I am traditional, I have shelved the hot cross buns for cinnamon buns with cream cheese icing, American style, as served by Jay Sherwood at Handlebar in Queenstown. If all I have done above is put you off making them, my redemption is letting you know that you will find the best coffee and bun combo at Handlebar and - don’t get me started on Jay’s smoked, barbecued meat sandwiches - mwah!
Ticking the chocolate box is a no-fail refrigerator slice and my favourite seasonal, black-fleshed plums meet cake batter for a handy dessert/cake.
Fresh plum pudding cake
Turning again to Laurie Black and a cake batter from her cookbook New Home Cooking, this is like a sponge pudding but better.
Serve warm with ice cream for dessert or cold with cream for morning or afternoon tea.
Use what fruit you have to hand, but Black Doris plums are my favourite - the tart fruit offsetting the sweet batter.
Serves 6-8
12 red-fleshed plums
½ cup sugar
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 tsp vanilla paste
Cake batter
3 eggs
250g sugar
250g flour
1 tsp baking powder
180g butter, melted
Method
Heat oven to 180°C. Cut plums in half and remove the stone (a small sharp knife is best for this). Lay in the bottom of a greased deep-sided baking dish (approx 20cm x 30cm) and sprinkle over ¼ cup sugar (more or less to suit taste), cardamom and vanilla paste.
Bake about 30 minutes until fruit is just beginning to collapse and weep colour.
For the cake batter, beat the eggs and sugar together until pale and foamy. Sift the flour and baking powder together and fold in to the egg mixture in three batches, alternating with the melted butter. Don't overmix.
Pour this batter over the dish of baked plums and cook in the oven for 40 to 50 minutes until a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.
Slice warm for dessert or leave to cool in the tin before slicing and storing in an airtight container for a day or two.
Dust with icing sugar to serve.
Cinnamon buns
My friend Jane Shaw (ex-Provisions of Arrowtown) makes the ultimate sticky bun, but I cannot divulge her recipe, so it is from another dear friend and expert baker, Laurie Black, that I have drawn this recipe.
The buns can simply be glazed with an egg and 2 Tbsp water mix before baking but I have iced them as Jay Sherwood does at Handlebar.
Makes 20
Dough
300ml milk
120g butter
3 tsp active dried yeast
750g standard flour
½ cup sugar
1 tsp salt
1 egg, beaten
Filling
100g butter, softened
1/3 cup sugar
2 Tbsp cinnamon
Icing
150g cream cheese, softened
45g butter, softened
1/3 cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp lemon juice
Method
Heat milk until almost boiling, then pour into a mixer bowl and stir in butter until melted. When the mixture is lukewarm whisk in the yeast to dissolve. Add remaining dough ingredients. Using the mixer’s dough hook, knead at a slow speed for 10 minutes to make a soft ball of dough (adjust with a little water or flour if dough is too stiff or sticky).
Cover dough and leave to rise for an hour in a warm spot that is at least 24°C with no draft. Don’t leave this part to chance; you won’t get a rise if the room is too cold. The oven (switched off) can be a good place.
Roll out dough on a very lightly floured work surface to a 50cm x 20cm rectangle.
Spread softened butter evenly over dough, then mix sugar and cinnamon together and sprinkle evenly over the butter.
Starting with the long edge, roll up the dough into a scroll. Cut into about 20 even pieces (2cm to 3cm). Place each roll cut side up into two paper-lined brownie pans (leaving space around each one) or into large paper-lined muffin tins. Cover with a clean cloth and allow to prove, in that warm draft-free spot again, for up to an hour or until doubled in size.
Bake at 200°C for 20 to 30 minutes until golden brown.
Mix icing ingredients together and spread over buns while still warm.
Whisky raisin no-bake chocolate slice
Easy to make and handy to have in the fridge for after-dinner treats and apres great Otago outdoor activity pick-me-ups.
The satisfying wee whisky hit makes this sweet adults only.
Makes 50-60 small squares
2 cups raisins
¼ cup whisky
200g butter
350g can condensed milk
¼ cup cocoa powder
375g biscuits (I used a mix of vanilla wine and shortbread), roughly crushed
1/3 cup walnuts, roughly chopped
Icing
150g dark chocolate
50g butter
Method
Soak the raisins in the whisky for an hour or two.
Line a rectangular cake tin (approx 20cm x 20cm) with baking paper.
Melt the butter, condensed milk and cocoa in a large saucepan.
Remove from heat and stir in the raisin mix, crushed biscuits and walnuts.
Spoon into the prepared tin, smoothing with the back of a spoon.
Melt the chocolate and butter together and spread over the slice in a thin layer.
Cover and refrigerate overnight to set before removing from the tin and storing in an airtight container in the fridge, slicing into squares to serve as required.
