These are the classic British Iced Buns from the Great British Baking Show. A classic brioche dough bun, with lemon icing. You can fill them or leave them unfilled, no matter how you serve them they’re sure to be a huge hit.
British Buns
I saw these in Collection 2 of the Great British baking Show on Netflix. And surprise surprise they’re the bake this week for our fab bake-along group. Join us! Or follow along on Instagram by following me or our hashtag #gbbobakealong
Brioche Iced Buns
The SHOWSTOPPER challenge for Sweet Dough week was 24 Brioche Buns. Two different styles of brioche buns, any style, 12 of each kind.
These Brioche Iced Buns were made by Becca. When I saw their simplicity I knew I wanted to try them out.
But my bakers can make 12 buns of ANY flavor, any style of buns, not just Brioche Iced Buns. Some of the bakers made incredibly complicated buns, some bakers made complete trainwreck buns, and some people nailed it with their buns.
Whatever kind of Briche you’re making be sure to leave a lot of time for rising. I mean like a MINIMUM of 6-8 hours. They are slow to rise. the eggs, butter, and milk slow it down a lot. Just start them the night before you want to make them, or early in the morning.
I did BOTH when testing this recipe, and I liked having them get a good long rise overnight but I didn’t like it after sitting in the fridge. I felt like it took too long for the dough to recover from it’s chilly storage. So I prefer to make them before I wake up everyone for school and let them do their magic while I’m out and about.
Paul Hollywood’s Iced Buns
These ALSO happen to be a Paul Hollywood FAVORITE. I found a masterclass on YouTube where he makes them with Mary Berry. That was a lot of fun to watch. If you’re making these I recommend you watch it, there are quite a few good tips on kneading, yeast, sugar and so on.
Because this IS Paul Hollywood’s Iced Buns, I translated the measurements from weights to cups.
YES I KNOW weighing is the best way (weigh?) to measure ingredients BUT some people don’t have scales. One of my missions with my bake-along is to make it inclusive, so whenever I can weigh and translate to cups.
Please remember to sift the flour, and then scoop and level it. You can run it through a sieve too. Just don’t let it be a packed down mess or you’ll be sorry.
Iced Finger Buns
When I was researching I found that a lot of people call these Iced Finger Buns. I was surprised that not a lot of Halloween recipes came up for that search term. Most of them seemed to be these Brioche iced Buns. Hmmm…
British Iced Buns
Ingredients
- 4 cups sifted bread flour +more for kneading
- 1 TBSP instant yeast
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 1/3 cup powdered sugar
- 150 ml warm milk
- 140 ml warm water
- 2 eggs
- 3 1/2 TBSP softened butter
- 1 cup powdered sugar (for icing)
- lemon juice or milk to make icing
Instructions
- put the flour in a mixing bowl, add the instant yeast to the bowl, add the salt to the other side of the bowl, and the sugar in another area--use a fork to swirl the flour mix around
- pour in the warm milk, HALF the water
- then add the eggs and the butter
- mix everything together until the dough starts to come together, add the last of the water, and mix again until the dough forms, it will be a very soft dough
- spread flour on a clean counter and scrape the dough out of the bowl
- sprinkle a little flour on top of the dough
- knead until the dough is smooth, soft and stretchy
- add up to 1/2 cup of flour while kneading, be sure not to add too much, add just enough to keep the dough from being too sticky
- cover the dough tightly, and let the dough slowly rise at room temperature until doubled in size, 6-8 hours
- carefully scrape the dough out on to a floured counter, sprinkle top with a little flour too
- weigh the dough and divide it into 12 equal pieces, if you don't have a scale just eyeball
- roll each piece into a ball and then use the palm of your hand to roll it into a roll about 5 inches long
- lay the rolls on a non-stick baking sheet, or parchment-covered baking sheet so that when the dough rises it touches the roll next to it
- preheat the oven to 375˚
- cover the rolls and let them rise until puffed and touching
- remove the cover and bake for 10 minutes in the preheated oven
- let them cool on the baking sheet
- mix the powdered sugar and just enough lemon juice or milk to make an icing that will drizzle but not run right off
- drizzle OR fully ice the buns
- *optional* you can split them and fill with jam or jelly
