Hot cross buns

Unless just baked in the last two hours .. Morrisons freshly baked hot cross buns......

I sometimes eat cold but the best way is butter and cinnamon and then microwave for about 40 secs

toasted

and slightly burnt with salted butter

sometimes with cheese too

haven't bought any yet looking forward to seeing the flavours this year

I usually buy my buns from the in store bakery rather than the pre-packed ones on the shelf. Morrisons are my first choice. When they are super-fresh I have them cold with butter and when they are a couple of days old (not that they generally hang around) I have them toasted.

Really agree. Why can’t they turn off the machine at the bit of the process that puts the cross on and just call them hot buns, or spiced buns, or happy buns.

I'd rather eat them toasted. It's quite rare I'll eat one as is, though maybe with butter or if it's extra soft/fluffy and I have a mug of tea to hand.

I mean, there is no other way to have malt loaf surely?

Incidentally I recently discovered the joy of homemade malt loaf (a Nigel Slater recipe). Soreen is ok as far as it goes but home made is in a league of its own.

Split , toasted then cooled a bit .
No butter on mine thank you .
Lemon curd (which is why it needs to cool , don;t like it melted )

No new fangled flavours ,
No double choc chip/apple and cinnamon, cheese and chilli , salted bloody caramel
Just dried fruit ....... I might try the Marks lemon curd filled ones .

Aldi are doing some "Guess The Flavour" so heaven knows what they will be ,

If they are really fresh, and preferably homemade, then eating them fresh is delicious.
Otherwise toasted with butter (and maybe some honey)

YABU to eat them at all, they are vile.

Toasted. Raw hot cross buns are a travesty.

Glad it's not just me! Yes, I had to get to the bakers early because they closed I think around midday or when all the buns ran out. They were put in paper bags and were all warm and soft and my dad would slather them in butter as soon as I got home. Nothing else was open on Good Friday at all. I felt as though I was doing a really important job and I can still remember the excitement - and deliciousness!

Toasted

Yes that was me! Great excitement on Good Friday morning, the kids were sent to buy the hot cross buns first thing. We raced home with them still warm in their paper bags. As I remember the bakery wasn't open all day either, and most shops were closed all day.

Agree they were more of a treat because they were seasonal.

I did live in a small'ish village in the West Country so maybe things were different in town or in different parts of the country - or perhaps our village was just stuck in time. But that was my experience with hot cross buns. I remember the queue outside of the bakers and I used to be sent to join it, clutching half a crown. This would have been around 1962. As for toasters, I thought that that perhaps they were more frequently toasted these days because toasters make the process more convenient. Obviously not!

Edited to say that an earlier poster also remembers the baker's queue.

I’m 60 and I’ve never had an untoasted hot cross bun. I’m not sure why using the grill would prevent or discourage toasting…They were available well before GF in my childhood, definitely not just eaten on the day itself. There was no baker’s queue either.
Edit: what I mean is, if it’s about age it must have all changed pretty quickly.

Toasted is miles better. What does your friend think the word "hot" means in hot cross buns?

I've always eaten them toasted before but on Sunday I was in a hurry and ate one 'raw', and was surprised to find it perfectly acceptable, just a bit...limp.

Cut in half,few minutes in the air fryer.

Whoever eats them raw 😱 is just plain weird! Toasted with lashing of real butter dripping down the chin is the only normal way to go, surely, that's the law?

I would have them both ways but toasted with butter and jam is my favourite. My husband makes a dish at Easter. He butters and Jams them and then pops them in the oven covered in custard. One year he used nutella instead of jam and that was a hit.

It could be an age thing. I'm in my late sixties and I don't remember anyone toasting hot cross buns when I was a kid. They were also only eaten on Good Friday. People would queue up at the bakers in the morning to buy them warm. Maybe we didn't toast them because we bought them still warm and fresh and also because hardly anyone had a toaster - things were toasted under the grill.

I could, but they don’t taste the same, the dough is less rich, they’re a bit drier.

Yes but @Talipesmum couldn't you just have a toasted teacake?

Re the seasonal foodstuff angle. I do agree in principle but they are just too tasty. So our compromise is - all year round we buy maybe just one pack a week. Sometimes no packs, if we are in a crumpet mood instead. But in the lead up to Easter and after Easter, we buy several packs a week, so there is a true abundance of HCB goodness. So there is seasonal variation in consumption.

There is absolutely no waiting till Good Friday though. But we will have them for breakfast on Good Friday.