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Dessert

Hot Cross Buns

A sweet yeast bun with raisins or currants, baked with a cross frosting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Fannie Merritt Farmer · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Hot Cross Buns

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Add butter, sugar, and salt to milk.

  2. When lukewarm, add dissolved yeast cake, cinnamon, flour, and egg well beaten.

  3. When thoroughly mixed, add raisins, cover, and let rise overnight.

Shape and bake

  1. In morning, shape in forms of large biscuits.

  2. Place in pan one inch apart, let rise.

  3. Brush over with beaten egg.

  4. Bake twenty minutes.

  5. Cool.

  6. With ornamental frosting, make a cross on top of each bun.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

901Calories
28 gProtein
26 gFat
138 gCarbs

Counts 8 of 10 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 8 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Grape1/2 cup (76g)62
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Cinnamon1 tsp ground (2.6g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Cakenot in our table0
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Fannie Merritt Farmer. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the gluten network that traps gas and gives the buns their structure.
Yeast cake
Produces carbon dioxide as it ferments, making the dough rise.
Egg
Adds structure and richness, and beaten egg brushed on top gives the crust a glossy browning.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and adds richness.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the crust.
Milk
Adds moisture and milk proteins that soften the crumb and aid browning.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise overnight. Slow fermentation lets the yeast build gas and flavor gradually. Rising for too short a time leaves the buns dense, while the dough must be fully mixed first so the yeast is evenly distributed.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, butter, cinnamon, flour, egg, raisin):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, butter, cinnamon, flour, egg, raisin. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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