Happy Easter everyone! I hope you’re having a wonderful day, wherever you are, whatever you’re doing. I wanted to post these traditional Easter treats today for two reasons – one, they’re delicious. Two, they’re a little twist on tradition when Easter this year is out of the ordinary for us. Usually we have a big family gathering and an Easter egg hunt for the adorable little cousins, but this year we’re keeping it low key.

We started the morning decorating our Easter tree (which we put up every year) and had a long, lazy breakfast of poached eggs on toast.

I was the one in charge of poaching, and, without realising, cooked every single egg in the house! We had every single type of chocolate egg imaginable, but no regular eggs!

So I’ve just returned from the markets (which were thankfully open!) with some more eggs to tide mother and myself over for our plans for dinner tonight. We’re having a few friends over tonight, very low-key stuff.

What are your Easter plans? I hope they involve making hot cross buns!

Cardamom and chocolate hot cross buns

Makes 12

• 2 x 7g sachets dried yeast
• 4 cups plain flour
• 1/4 cup caster sugar
• 1 tsp cardamom
• 1/2 teaspoons mixed spice
• 1 ¼ cup dark chocolate chips
• ¼ cup sultanas
• 50g salted butter
• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs, lightly whisked

Flour paste

• ½ cup plain flour
• 51/2 – 6 tbsp water

Combine your yeast, flour, sugar, cardamom and mixed spice. Add in the sultanas and chocolate. Set to one side.

Melt your butter in a heavy-bottomed saucepan over a medium heat. Add the milk, then heat until it’s just above body temperature (you should be able to put your finger in the liquid and be able to feel slight warmth.)

Make  a well in the centre of your flour mixture and add in the milk and eggs. And mix well. Knead with your stand mixer at a medium speed for 4 minutes. If kneading by hand, knead for ten minutes.  You may need to rotate the dough a little bit so that the chocolate at the bottom doesn’t melt into the mixture.

Grease a bowl (with 1 tsp of melted butter) and pop the dough mixture in it. Fleck a tea towel with warm water and place over the top of the bowl.

Set in a warm place for 1 – 1.5 hours, until doubled in size.

Grab your dough and cut it into 12 equally-sized pieces (my pieces were 108g each) and shape them into balls by turning the dough under itself until it’s shaped like a ball. When you’re doing this, take a moment to admire the cross section of your dough. It’s legitimately good-looking. Also, don’t stress out if some of the yeast is still visible

Line them up on your greased tray and spread them out evenly. Set them in a warm spot to rise for 15-20 minutes. Cover with a tea towel flecked with water again.

While they’re rising, make your paste by mixing together the flour and water. Set to one side. Preheat your oven to 190°C.

Grab your risen dough and huddle them closer in together, so that they’re just touching. Pipe the crosses over them.

Pop them in the oven for 20-24 minutes.

Serve piping hot, with plenty of butter.

Ps if you like chocolate and cardamom together, check out this cake. It’s kind of awesome.