We set guest blogger Ella Tarn, baking wunderkind and the ‘Girl’ of the Girl V Cake blog, a Christmas challenge. How many ways can you shoe horn your fudge fix into the festivities …?
Christmas isn’t all about Fudge, but it’s a good place to start. It can’t get much better than a square (packet) of fudge and a cup (bucket) of tea to blow away those winter cobwebs after a hard day Christmas shopping (and by ‘shopping’ I mean migrating from café to café via the shops, resulting in subsequent panicked late-night internet shopping*).
Turns out it gets even better … I thank you Fudge Kitchen. Those sweet-tooth indulgers at my favourite type of kitchen have a plethora of fudge-related products for you to try in oh (ho ho) so many ways ….
*On that note – the kind folk at Fudge Kitchen are offering 15% off their ‘Mug Of Fudge’ which is quite literally just that – a fudgey alternative to hot chocolate, like liquid gold … but fudge. So skip that overpriced skinny pumpkin-gingerbread-spiced-christmas-hannukah latte and hurry home from your shopping trip to order one of these. Just use the code XMSMUG at checkout until the 15th December.
Fudge-laced Cinnamon Buns
No sense forestalling the fudge-slaught, so why not kick off with these super-easy fudge-laced Cinnamon Buns for a suitably inappropriate Christmas Day breakfast.
Cinnamon Buns are traditionally made with enriched dough and although a bit time-consuming it is worth the time if you have it. If you can be bothered, this is a great recipe for the dough: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/how_to_make_cinnamon_86187.
As we’re all busy with important Christmas-related tasks like watching ‘Chicken Run’ on repeat, however, you can cheat if you like and buy pre-made pastry (I was strapped for time when I last made these and used Jus Rol Puff Pastry for a change with great success).
Method:
- Preheat the oven to 200°C/180°C fan oven. Unroll your pre-bought puff pastry or roll out your pre-made dough onto a lightly floured surface.
- Combine the butter, sugar and cinnamon and spread over your pastry/dough
- Roll up the pastry/dough into a long sausage shape.
- Cut the sausage into roughly 1 inch slices and lie them flat on to a baking sheet (lining it with parchment minimises the mess after as the sugar does tend to stick to the baking sheet).
- Brush on the egg or milk, whichever you happen to hand and sprinkle with a little more sugar and bake in the oven for about 20mins until golden (follow the baking instructions for enriched dough if using).
- Once cooled, take a couple of tablespoons of your fudge sauce of choice (I used Butterscotch) and mix with icing sugar, one tablespoon at a time, until it has thickened slightly, or to taste. Drizzle over the buns and enjoy!