Mincemeat Yeast Buns

I have been doing a lot of yeast baking recently and  posted recipes for cinnamon buns and for poppy seed yeast buns, which were very soft and fluffy.

I still had a little mincemeat left over from Christmas and thought why not use some of this. The resulting buns are reminiscent of English Chelsea Buns.

This English fruit mix would be recognised in Poland as bakalie -Balkan mix.

The dough is soft and rather hard to handle. After the first rising the dough is NOT knocked back but just used as it is to make a rectangular shape. Putting the buns into a deep foil lined roasting tin helps to let them rise into shape.

Ingredients

• 250g strong flour
• 250g plain flour
• Half a tablespoon of dried yeast
• 50g butter
• 50g granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• Around 330ml milk
• *
• Several tablespoons of mincemeat

Method

• Line a roasting tin with foil taking it all up the sides.
• Warm a little of the milk and add the yeast.
• Leave for around 10 minutes.
• Mix the flours together.
• Rub the butter into the flour – like breadcrumbs.
• Add the sugar.
• Make a well in the centre and pour in the yeast mixture.
• Add the beaten egg
• Slowly add the milk – you might not need all of it.
• Use a knife first to start to bring everything together
• Then use your hands and form a soft dough ball.
• Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface for at least 5 minutes – even up to 10 minutes.
• Place the dough into a bowl, cover (a disposable shower cap is good) and leave to rise until the dough has doubled in size.
• Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured board.
• DO NOT KNOCK BACK THE DOUGH.
• Using you fingers gently flatten and shape the dough into a rectangle.
• Cover the dough with the mincemeat.
• Roll into a log.
• Slice into thick pieces.
• Place the pieces into the tin.
• Cover and leave to rise.
• Pre-heat the oven to GM6 – 200°C
• Once all the pieces are touching put in the hot oven.
• Bake for around 20 mins – check and maybe cover after 15mins.
• Drizzle with icing made with lemon juice and icing sugar or just dust with icing sugar
• Leave to cool in the tin on a cake grid.