Sarah's Maritozzi Italian Cream Buns
By Sarah Butler
10 people
30 minutes
160 minutes
Ingredients
- 60 g Butter cubes
- 500 ml Double Cream
- 1 - Egg whisked with 1 tablespoon milk for egg wash
- 2 - Eggs room temperature
- 1 tsp Ground Cinnamon
- 120 g Honey
- 140 g Icing Sugar
- 1 tbsp Instant Dried Yeast
- 1 zest Lemon finely grated
- 250 ml Milk
- 1 tsp Salt
- 540 g Strong White Flour plus extra for rolling
- 2 tsp Vanilla Extract
Method
- Make the water roux. Take 90g of the flour from the whole measurement and whisk with 120ml of water in a saucepan until smooth. Heat on medium heat and stir until it thickens to become a roux. You want it to reach 65 degrees Celsius and it will take about 5 minutes.
- Remove from the heat and whisk in the butter, milk, honey, eggs and salt and whisk until the butter melts.
- Place the rest of the flour, yeast, cinnamon and lemon zest in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook and mix to combine.
- Add the roux to the flour mix and knead until elastic. Add a bit more flour if the mixture is too wet. It needs to be elastic and stretchy but not break. You should be able to pull it apart between your fingers and see through it without it breaking which is called the windowpane effect. Roll it into a ball making sure that there are no cracks on top of the ball and allow it to rise in a warm place to triple in size which will take between 45 minutes to 1.5 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Punch down the dough and knead in the well drained sultanas. For first timers I would suggest making these without the sultanas as they add a lot of moisture which can be challenging for those working with this dough the first time.
- Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Lightly flour your hands and a surface and shape 12-13 buns. I divide the dough in half and roll it into a log and then cut into six pieces and weigh out each bun on a digital scale so that they're the same size (mine were around 90g/3ozs each). Make sure that there are no cracks on the tops or bottoms. Just keep rolling the balls on the countertop and the cracks will disappear.
- Leave the buns in a warm place to rise again for 45 minutes. Brush with egg wash and bake for 20-23 minutes. Cool completely on a rack.
- Once completely cooled, cut the buns with a serrated knife but do not cut all the way through.
- Whip the cream with the icing sugar and vanilla until thick and fluffy. Place into a piping bag and snip the end. Pipe into the split of the bun making the gap wide.
- With a dough scraper, scrape down the centre so that it is smooth and use this to scrape off any cream from the sides. Dust with icing sugar. These buns are best filled just before serving.
