Apple & Cinnamon Buns (with drunken raisins)
Do you know about anyone who doesn’t like cinnamon buns?
I don’t. Not at all.
Just a few weeks ago, my boyfriend and me, we had a moving in party at our new place. It’s a lovely apartmentment with an awesome spacius kitchen and – with a beautiful garden with red current, raspberry bushes and an apple tree 🍏
Since the party was about moving to this lovely place, I wanted to bake something that would be, in some way, connected to it.
I have been using berries in all different kinds of cakes, dessert, etc. rrecently, so I wanted to make something different. At the same time, apples in the garden begin to ripen and I couldn’t wait to use them in baking!
I wanted to bake sometihing classic, not much experimental, but original. Something, that everyone knows but at the sometime will be surprised once taking the first bite!
Last but not least, in these difficult times, one should serve food in individual portions so that guests don’t need to touch anything else that their own piece of cake!
When I summed it up, I came to bake either muffins or buns. Well, finally, I did both – Apple Buckwheat Muffins with Walnuts and Berries and Apple Cinnamon Buns! Recipe for muffins will appear on my blog soon, while the recipe for Apple Cinnamon Buns follows right below!
Apple & Cinnamon Buns (with drunken raisins)
INGREDIENTS
FOR THE DOUGH:
8g fresh yeast
50g softened unsalted butter
250ml milk
5 tsp agave sirup
400g fine spelt flour
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
FOR THE FILLING:
150g unsweetened apple sauce
50g softened unsalted butter
ground cinnamon
handful of raisins soaked in rhum
INSTRUCTIONS:
The first think I do is taking a hanful of raisins, placing them into a bowl (better to use a wider bowl where risins are laying in one even layer) and pour a bit of rhum over them, cover the bowl with a plastic foil and let the raisins “get drunk” while preparing the buns 😉 This step is not necessary, you can either soak raisins just in water or skip them completely, if you aren’t a fan of raisins!
Ok, raisins are happily bathing in the rum, it’s high time you started working with the yeast!
In a small sauce pan, warm the milk, agave sirup and butter up to 37°C- 40°C then add the yeast and a bit of flour and set aside – the yeast needs approximately 10 minutes to get activated and to grow.
In a large bowl, mix flour, salt and cardamom.
Place one third of the flour mixture into a bowl of a kitchen robot and pour the liquids over. Start the robot on a slow speed and let the dry and liquid parts to slowly incorpporate. Gradually add the remaining flour so that the dough becomes pliable and does not stick.
Cover the bowl and leave the dough to rise in a worm place for about an hour.
Roll the dough out on a floured surface and stretch into an ish 50cm x 45cm rectangle.
First, spread the softened butter evenly all over the surface and then do the same with the apple sauce. Then drain the rasines and spread them evenly also.
Last but not least, sprinkle cinnamon evenly over the filling (be generous!).
Now carefully lift one third (closest to you) of the dough and fold it up to two thirds, then close it with lifting the third third (furthest from you) and placing it over the already rolled dough. In this way, you will get a rectangle of ish 50cm x 15cm.
Cut the dough into stripes (each approximately 3cm wide).
Now be careful, you need to gently stretch each stripe and twist two, three times and then tie it into a bun, pressing its ends to the centre or to the buttom – so that the bun doesn’t open when growing in the oven. This part is tricky because the filling tends to ran out and you’ll eventually get quite dirty, but don’t you worry, it’s just fine!
Place the buns on a baking sheet lined with baking paper, cover them with a cloth and let them rest for some 30minutes.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 180°C
Coat the buns with beaten egg and bake for about 12 – 15 minutes or until golden.