Mini hot cross bun doughnuts

Deep-fried hot cross buns, people. Easter treats just don't get any better than this! Wait, maybe they do, 'cos I have some fabulous Easter recipes coming up in the next week so hang onto your sweet tooth! 

Sometimes people ask me how I think of deep-frying a hot cross bun. And the answer is that I dream about food at night. Not in that 'swimming in melted chocolate' kind of way (although isn't that what we'd all like!) but more in a 'wake up in the middle of the night with a recipe idea' kind of way. Which makes me pretty food-obsessed but it's where I get my best ideas. Like deep-frying hot cross buns, or making millionaire shortbread into a cake or giving sweetie pies a red velvet twist. Let's be honest, it's a little weird (or a lot weird, depending on your weird-o-meter), but we all have our quirks! Mine just happens to result in yummy things!

Photograph by Gunther Schubert of Vorsprung Studio

Mini hot cross bun doughnuts

Makes 24

60g butter or margarine

420g cake flour

1 tsp salt

50ml sugar

1 tsp mixed spices

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp mixed peel (optional)

10g Instant dry yeast

1 egg, beaten

200ml warm water

½ cup raisins (or chocolate chips)

Crosses

¼ cup flour

1 tbsp oil

2 tbsp water

Oil, for deep-frying

Castor sugar, to dust

Rub the butter into the flour and mix in salt, sugar, spices and mixed peel, if using. Add the yeast and mix. Beat the egg and warm water together and add to the dough. Mix to form a soft dough then knead for 5-10 minutes until smooth and elastic.

Divide into 24 pieces and roll into balls. Place on a lightly floured surface, cover and allow to rise until doubled in size. Mix the flour, oil and water together and place in a piping bag. Pipe crosses onto the buns. Heat a large pot of oil to 180C and fry the doughnuts, in batches until golden and puffed. Remove from oil and immediately dust in castor sugar.

Easter Entertaining - Easter table setting and Easter food ideas

A friend of mine, who just happens to be the most fabulous fashionista in the country, last week dubbed me 'The Coco Chanel of cooking'. What a scary (but extremely flattering) title! But if I'm the 'Coco Chanel of Cooking' then my colleague Matanna is definitely Martha Stewart. Matanna, is probably the only person on this planet that understands the joy that bunting, pastel colours, bunnies and bows bring to my life. She just gets me. We teamed up for an Easter Entertaining shoot recently which was shot for Expresso Breakfast Show (where we both work - and play!) and I just had to share what we came up with.

Heard the saying 'location, location, location!'? Well, in television, this is the golden rule of anything looking beautiful on screen. And for gorgeous decor and food to look good, it has to be surrounded by breathtaking scenery. Ours was the Cellars-Hohenort hotel in leafy Constantia, Cape Town. Their gardens are absolutely magnificent and we both felt like we'd gone 'down the rabbit hole' into a wonderland.  

Pastels, florals prints, lace and bunting set the scene with bunnies (chocolate and fluffy ones) and eggs (again, chocolate and the real kind) adorning the table. It was all about the attention to detail. What I loved most about Matanna's decor, is that all of it can be recreated at home. For the table she used scraps of fabric and lace and simply draped them over each other. The cups and paper plates were painted in pastels - the plates topped with paper doilies so our little guests could eat off them. 

Photography and food styling by Katelyn Williams
 Decor styling by Matanna Katz

Speaking of eating, there was no shortage of treats. The whole idea of Easter for me is spending time with family and the last thing I want to be doing, is slaving away in the kitchen so I opted for a fuss-free spread. 

Marshmallows or sweets piled into glass jars are pretty and great for little hands to snack on. My favourites, were probably these cute 'carrots' made by dipping strawberries into orange-tinted white chocolate. How adorable?!

The Hot Cross Bun macarons I prepared in my post here were piled onto a pretty cake stand alongside the real buns that inspired them.

 For something on the savoury side, I made dainty tea sandwiches and simply used bunny cookie cutters to cut out cute shapes. So simple but so pretty.

And of course, a few pastel-coloured cupcakes to go with the colour scheme. After all, Julia Child once said, 'a party without cake is just a meeting'. Too true.

 Ending off on a sweet note, a VERY sweet one, I set up a mini 'Easter Sundae' bar. Easter Sundae - get it? Okay, I'll stop. Cute buckets held an array of toppings: caramel fudge sauce, sweet croutons made from Oats 'n honey loaf, caramel popcorn and speckled mini Easter eggs were all layed out to adorn vanilla ice cream. The kids will love this! 

A beautiful and easy-to-do spread. Accompany this with an Easter egg hunt in the garden and there is no way you can go wrong. Happy Easter everyone! 

VIEW THE INSERT AIRED ON EXPRESSO BREAKFAST SHOW SABC3 HERE: