Happy Easter !!

Last week, a friend called to ask me if I could bake some Easter cookies for her & she brought me a very lovely Williams-Sonoma Easter cookie cutter set. After baking & decorating, the cookies are supposed to be interlocked & standing.

So we spent Good Friday baking & decorating the cookies. It was a lot of fun for both the kids & adults too. Hubby & I did the outline & flooding of the cookies, CJ was in-charge of checking if all the cookies were well flooded at every corner, also helping me with colouring the royal icing & washing up. She's a real helper in my bakery now :)

I followed the cookie recipe that's printed on the box & found the dough too soft so some of the baked & decorated cookie broke before I had the chance to assemble & take pictures of them. So I'm only left with these few cookies :


There's supposed to be a standing grass patch underneath the bunny so it could stand but it broke ! The girls had quite a few broken cookies this 2 days.



This duckling survived !

Standing Easter egg



Hot Cross Buns


We were out shopping & only got home when it was almost time for the KL F1 Grand Prix but the rain came at the wrong time so Astro's out. Instead of lazing around, I thought of bread making.

Since it's Easter, I decided on hot cross buns.

By the time the buns were done, it was about 6.30pm. We had a very late lunch at 3pm, so these buns were our light dinner. A very satisfying one, warm hot cross buns on a rainy Sunday evening......

* RECIPE FOR MY HOT CROSS BUNS *


400g High protein flour
100g Plain flour
6g Instant yeast
40g Sugar
52g Maple syrup (can be replaced with honey)
30g Egg yolk
170g Milk
72g Butter
6g Mixed spice
100g Sultanas

Flour paste :

1/2 cup flour
4 Tbsp water

Mix flour with water till a paste form, if too thick, just add a little more water.


1. Mix all ingredients, except butter & sultanas in a mixer with a dough hook on low speed until combined, add butter & continue to mix on medium speed for about 15 mins until dough is fully developed. Add sultanas.
Cover bowl & let rise in a warm place for 1 hr or until dough doubles in bulk.

2. Divide the dough into 48g portions & mould them round, place them onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper, let proof for about 20 mins.
Place the flour paste in a piping bag, snip the corner off with scissors, pipe a cross on top of each bun.
3. Bake in a preheated oven of 190 degrees for 14-15 mins.


* This recipe yields 24 buns. Arrange buns in an order of 6x4 on a rectangle tray. I always bake my buns at the bottom rack for the first half of the baking time then rotate to the top rack after that for the top to brown. Once the buns are done, brush the top with sugar glaze while still hot.
I just make a simple glaze with about 2 Tbsp of sugar to 1 Tbsp of boiling water, stir till sugar is dissolved & brush on the buns.