If your dried fruits are hard hydrate them in 30 ml warm water or rum for a few minutes before starting.

We start by blooming the yeast in a small bowl with warm milk and sugar. Stir and set aside for 10 mins until frothy.

Add the egg and milk yeast mixture. Mix everything together until combined and no dry pockets. The dough will be sticky and that’s perfect.

Clean your hands using the scraper/rubber spatula and add oil onto your hands, around the mixing bowl and on the dough. Cover and leave to rise for over an hour or until doubled in volume.

After the dough has risen, remove the covering and oil your hands well before knocking the dough back. Transfer to a clean work surface and bang the dough onto the surface multiple times until it is smooth and not sticky.

Portion the dough into 3 parts, flavor one piece with the soaked dried fruit, flavor the second piece with chocolate chips (it better to work with frozen chips or fridge cold) and the flavor the third piece with lemon zest and fresh blueberries.

Working with one piece at a time incorporate the flavorings into the dough, when working with the dried fruit flavor the dough might get sticky due to the moisture in the fruit, you can add up to 2 tbsp of flour if it is excessively sticky. Form into balls and cut each piece into 6 portions. Hence we will get 18 buns in total (6 pieces from each flavor).

Roll the dough into balls and transfer to the baking tray lined with baking paper. Cover and leave to rise for 15 – 20 mins until they are bigger. At this time, preheat the oven to 180℃.

Let us make the mixture for the crosses, mix the flour and water together until combined, transfer to a piping bag. Once the buns have risen, brush them with an egg wash generously and pipe them with the cross mixture.

Bake them for 22-25 mins. They will be done when they are golden and risen, they will also have a hollow sound if you tap them. They will have a crust while they are hot.

Brush them with honey while still warm and serve with butter and jam.