Saffransbullar - Swedish Saffron Buns

The sweet yeast rolls are so popular in Sweden all year round, just think about cinnamon buns and Semla buns, but in the Christmas season, there is some special yummy dessert flavoured with golden saffron. Saffransbullar or saffron buns are one of these treats. Even Christmas is far away, I really wanted to treat myself to these golden buns, so I've prepared a batch.

It's perfect for a couple of days as a dessert or a good option for breakfast with a cup of coffee or tea.

Ingredients

Dough

• 50 g fresh yeast
• 175 g butter
• 1 g saffron
• 160 g sugar
• 500 ml milk
• 1 pinch salt
• 900 g flour
• 1 egg for egg-wash
• pearl sugar

Almond filling

• 200 g almond paste (mandelmassa)
• 100 g butter
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

Almond filling

1. Soften the butter with a hand mixer.
2. Add the sugar and the almond paste, beat it till you get a smooth mixture.

Dough

1. Crumble the yeast into a bowl.
2. Melt the butter.
3. Crush the saffron with a few tablespoons of sugar in a mortar.
4. Add the sugar-saffron mixture and the milk to the butter, heat it up to lukewarm. If you don't want to leave the saffron pieces in the dough, filter this liquid.
5. Pour it into the bowl with the yeast and leave it to rest for 5-10 minutes.
6. Add the leftover sugar and the salt, then start incorporating the flour gradually while mixing the dough by using dough hooks on your hand mixer.
7. Once the dough came together, cover its bowl with a tea towel and let it rise for 30 minutes in a warm place, it should be double in size at the end.
8. Take it out of the bowl and place the dough on a floured surface and lightly knead it through.
9. Once the dough is ready to fill with rich sweet almond paste, the method of how I form the buns is the following: I roll the dough to about half a cm thick, then cover it evenly with the filling. After this, I cut it in half (along the long side). I fold each rectangular in half (along the long side), then cut them into 3 cm wide strips. I grab one of these stripes, hold both ends of the dough while forming a spiral by twisting it. To create the bun, I form a spiral, then fold the end of the twisted dough stripe under the bun.
10. Place the buns on a lined baking tray.
11. Give them an egg wash and sprinkle some pearl sugar on top.
12. Bake them in the preheated oven, at 200 °C, for smaller buns: 15 minutes, large buns: 25-30 minutes. At halftime turn the tray around.
13. Let them cool down to room temperature before serving.

TIP: If you have some dry leftover buns, don't waste them. Let's prepare a yummy bread pudding with vanilla sauce.

Saffransbullar Bread Pudding

Ingredients

Vanilla dressing

• 800 ml whole milk
• 1 tsp vanilla paste or the seeds of one fresh vanilla pod
• 3 egg yolks
• 5 tbsp sugar

Saffransbullar bread pudding

• Leftover saffransbullar
• Ground walnut
• Icing sugar
• Cinnamon, cardamom
• Melted butter
• 2 tsp of gluten-free flour or corn starch

Instructions

Vanilla dressing

1. I heated up the whole milk with vanilla paste.
2. In the meantime, I've mixed the egg yolks with the sugar till the mixture got a plain yellow colour.
3. I've added some warm milk to the egg yolks, stirred them together, then slowly poured this mixture back into the pot and without boiling, I cooked till it thickened a little bit.
4. I poured half of this warm vanilla dressing into a measuring jug and keep the other part in the pot for now.

Saffransbullar bread pudding

1. I've arranged a layer of the bun slices in a small, deep baking tray.
2. Then I poured some of the warm vanilla dressing on them and sprinkled some ground walnut, icing sugar, cinnamon, cardamom on the top. I've repeated to create the layers I run out of bun slices.
3. Before I've put the baking tray into the oven I smeared the top of the bread pudding with melted butter, then baked it at 180 °C, till it became golden brown.
4. Till it became ready to serve I've stirred the gluten-free flour into the vanilla dressing I've left in the pot, and cooked it till it thickened.
5. I've served the bread pudding with the vanilla sauce on the top, it was a filling breakfast, so always think twice before you waste something, you might turn the leftovers into a great dish.

If you like the classic poppy seed bread pudding instead, you can find the recipe here.

Did YOU try this recipe?

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