Cinnamon raisin spelt buns

This week I’ve been thinking about happiness. It’s a bit of a stressful time at the moment at casa del Leask. There’s a load of stuff going on in our lives, and it’s easy to spend all of my time worrying and over thinking every thing. This mind set is a habit of a lifetime, and the place that I automatically go when things are feeling overwhelming. This is also precisely the type of thinking that I’m trying to improve on.

I think it’s important to acknowledge and deal with the stressful stuff as burying it wouldn’t be fostering happiness, but rather the illusion of it. But I also think there’s a big line between working through stuff and allowing it to completely rule every moment and every thought to the exclusion of all of the wonderful things that are going on too. I think that it’s at the stressful and not so sunny moments that it becomes important to make the effort to consciously think about happy stuff. I think it’s a good way to keep things in perspective and to create new habits for my mind whereby it isn’t utterly consumed with worry. This is, after all, the crux of my mission magnificent. It’s not much of a mission when things are peachy, but when there’s something to strive toward and to work on, that’s when the mission’s really under way.

So with that in mind I started to think about what makes me happy. I am extraordinarily fortunate in that I have a lot to be happy about. I have Buddy, my boys, and an incredible family behind me. I have some truly dear and lifelong friends. I have our dog and a house and food on the table, and live in a place where the worries that I face are all pretty superficial. We are safe and warm and well fed.

Then there is a whole world of moments and senses that bring me real joy. Lying on the couch and cuddling with the boys, sitting in the window on a rainy day with a cup of cocoa and a good book, the memory of swimming in the middle of the Atlantic ocean along side a beautiful tall ship with my crew mates, music, Dr. Seuss, the smell of pine tar and of freshly baked bread… and baking.

I was working on these cinnamon raisin spelt buns the other day,and was wrist deep in dough with Radio Scotland on and I was, in that moment, one hundred percent content. Ever since I first started baking I knew that I like it more than I reasonably should, but at that moment of complete satisfaction it became evident that the whole process of bread making taps into some sunny spot in my brain and makes me feel completely at ease. I swear it must be doing good things for my brain chemistry. I’m not really sure what it is about it, the tactility of it, the smells, the knowledge that I’m doing something for my family and we’ll all sit down together and enjoy wholesome, warm buns when I’m done. I don’t know. Whatever it is, it’s something to revel in and to embrace.

So here’s wishing you all the things that make you happy, and some cinnamon raisin spelt buns!

Cinnamon raisin spelt buns

2015-09-14 13:47:39

Based around a traditional Scandinavian recipe, these cinnamon raisin spelt buns are as warm and comforting as they are wholesome and nutritious.

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Ingredients

1. 400g whole spelt flour
2. 7g instant yeast
3. 1 tsp salt
4. 2 Tbsp honey
5. 150g raisins
6. 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
7. 300mL water at room temperature
8. 1 egg, beaten, for glazing

Instructions

1. In a large bowl mix together the flour and cinnamon.
2. Add the salt to one side of the bowl and the yeast to the other being sure they don’t touch at this stage as the salt will kill the yeast if they come into direct contact.
3. In a jug, dissolve the honey in the water.
4. Add about 3/4 of the honey water to the flour and begin to turn it together with your fingers, squashing it through to form a dough. Add more of the water as needed to get a fairly sticky dough.
5. Leaving it in the bowl, add the raisins and knead them through for a few minute until the raisins are evenly distributed. Cover with cling film and leave to rise about an hour, until doubled in size.
6. Preheat the oven to 220 degrees Celsius and line two baking trays with baking parchment.
7. Once the dough is risen, tip it onto a well floured surface and gently divide the dough into 12 pieces, rolling each to form a ball. Place them on the trays with room between. Place the trays into a large plastic bag each and leave to prove for 30 minutes.
8. Once proved brush each bun with the beaten egg before putting it in the oven. Leave to bake for about 20 minutes, or until the buns are golden brown. Remove from the trays and leave them on a wire rack to cool.

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