St. Lucy Saffron Buns

In celebration of St. Lucy's feast day, we made St. Lucy Saffron Buns last Saturday (December 13, the actual day). We used this recipe but modified it for the ingredients we had in the house and for the bread machine.

Ingredients for dough

• 3/4 cup milk
• pinch saffron threads
• 1/4 cup of vanilla yogurt
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 cup white, granulated sugar
• 4 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick, 4 Tbsp) unsalted butter, cubed
• 2 1/4 teaspoons yeast

Ingredients for glaze

•  Raisins
• 1 egg, beaten
• Demerara or other large crystal sugar for sprinkling

Warm the milk, then add the saffron directly to the milk.

Saffron milk

Let it steep for 10-15 minutes. Add all the dough ingredients to the bread machine. When the dough cycle finishes, put the dough in the fridge until the morning.

The dough

In the morning, divide the dough into 14 pieces and roll each piece into a 10 inch rope.  Shape and allow to rise for 30 min to an hour.

14 pieces

Swirly is a good shape

Happy in her work!

Almost finished

When risen, brush with egg, insert raisins, and sprinkle with sugar.

Finishing touch and another swirling idea

Bake at 400 F for 10 minutes.

Cooling on the rack

Closeup of the other style of swirling

L didn't like this recipe - not sweet enough and the saffron flavor was too pronounced for her.

Not a happy customer

The rest of the family liked it more but we will probably not make it outside of St. Lucy's day.

A satisfied customer