A light soft crumb where the flavours of tangy citrus and tart cranberries balance out the sweetness of the bake. These top tea cakes with fresh cranberries are pure comfort food, especially when slathered with butter.
Sweet pastries and breads is the challenge for Teatime Treats which is set by Karen of Lavender and Lovage this month. I thought I had a sweet tooth, but you should see what Karen gets for tea.
I was going to enter these cinnamon and chocolate buns which I made for an al fresco tea party back in the summer. But then I picked up my copy of Short & Sweet and there was no looking back. Dan’s top tea cakes were just crying to be made. Why? Well not only did they use loads of peel (and I had quite a lot of my candied lemon and orange peel to use up), but they also had chocolate in them. Chocolate? Really?
Top Tea Cakes with Fresh Cranberries
Well, you could of course use beef dripping, but if you’re a vegetarian like me, you can, according to Dan, substitute this with a good quality white chocolate as the cocoa butter gives a softer consistency to the crumb than would butter. It all sounded rather intriguing and I was keen to try it out.
I sort of followed Dan’s recipe, which you can see here. But as regular readers know, I tend to go my own way. So I used half plain bread flour and half wholemeal. I also only used 50g currants and I added 150g fresh cranberries cut in half. Strange as it may seem, I didn’t use lard. Instead, I went with white chocolate and my own mixed peel, which I cut into pieces with a pair of scissors.
I found this rather a lengthy and faffy process and I wasn’t at all enthused by the stickiness of the dough which I found quite hard to work with. And I was also rather upset that my teacake tops got burnt. I’ve lowered the temperature a little in the recipe so that the same thing doesn’t happen to you.
The Best Tea Cakes
But despite the mishaps, I have to say these were the BEST tea cakes I’ve ever eaten. They were also huge. I divided the dough into ten pieces rather than the nine that Dan had stated and they were still massive. This of course was by no means a bad thing, but twelve or a baker’s dozen would produce a more reasonable size.
So what made them so good? The combination of tangy citrus peel and the tartness of cranberries balances the sweetness of the teacake itself. The crumb is deliciously soft, just as Dan had promised. CT hates mixed peel, but he loved these tea cakes slathered in butter. He reckoned they were possibly the ultimate comfort food.
Other Yeasted Bun Recipes You Might Like
- Baked yeast doughnuts
- Chocolate Chelsea buns
- Cornish saffron buns
- Hot cross buns (vegan)
- Kouglof buns with almonds & rum soaked raisins
- Mincemeat buns
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you try this recipe for tea cakes, with or without the fresh cranberries, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
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If you’d like more bread type recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious and nutritious, of course.
Choclette x
Fresh Cranberry Tea Cakes. PIN IT.
Tea Cakes with Fresh Cranberries – The Recipe
Tea Cakes with Fresh Cranberries
Ingredients
- 3 tsp dried yeast
- 125 ml warm water
- 300 g wholemeal flour
- 300 g strong white flour
- 150 ml milk
- 1 tbsp golden syrup
- 25 g golden caster sugar
- 50 g white chocolate roughly chopped
- 150 g fresh cranberries halved – or substitute 100g dried
- 50 g currants
- 100 g chopped mixed peel (I used homemade peel)
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp grated nutmeg
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 3 medium eggs
- a little milk for brushing
Instructions
- Dissolve the yeast in the warm water with 3 tbsp of the wholemeal flour. Stir well, then leave for 15 minutes to ferment. Meanwhile, heat the milk until near boiling. Add the golden syrup, caster sugar, white chocolate, currants, peel, spices and salt. Give it a good stir, remove from the heat and leave to cool.
- Break the the eggs into the milk and beat to combine. Place the flour into a large bowl. Add the yeast and milk mixtures along with the cranberries and stir well until everything is combined. Cover the bowl with a clean tea towel or plastic bag and leave to rest for 10 minutes.
- Oil your hands and knead the dough lightly on an oiled surface. Leave for a few minutes then knead again. Repeat once more so that the dough has had three light kneads over 30 minutes. Cover with a tea towel and leave to rest for a further 30 minutes.
- Divide the dough into twelve equal portions and shape into balls. Roll or pat the balls out to form rounds of about 2 cm high. Place them on two greased baking trays about 3-4 cm apart. Cover with a clean tea towel or place inside plastic bags and leave in a warm place for 1½ hours or until doubled in height.
- Set the oven to 200℃ (400℉, Gas 6). Brush the tops with milk and bake for 15 minutes or until the bottoms sound hollow when tapped. Be careful not to over bake as the tea cakes should be soft inside.
- Eat with butter whilst still warm or allow to cool on a wire rack. Best eaten on the day of baking or freeze.
Notes
Nutrition Estimate
Sharing
This was one of the first #shortandtweet challenges, which I now wish I’d done along with everyone else. I shamelessly called for help when I was having problems folding the very sticky dough.
I’m also entering this into Ren’s commendable Simple and in Season blog event, which is something I thoroughly approve of.
Fabulicious Food says
Hi Choclette, thank you so much for mentioning me and for linking up these delicious morsels to Simple and in Season, perfect to cheer me up in this cold weather. Ren xx
Karen S Booth says
OMG! I never came here to comment……and yet I remember drooling over these! GREAT TTT entry thanks! Karen
Baking Addict says
Great choice! I haven’t gotten round to making my tea time treat yet but I was thinking cinnamon buns or bread. Not sure I’m brave enough to tackle pastry! This recipe looks interesting indeed – beef dripping?? I’d much prefer chocolate 🙂 I do love ctirus peel so I’m sure I will enjoy these. I will save space for the virtual tea party 🙂
Choclette says
Roz, these were such a treat. If only they weren’t quite so time consuming, I ‘d be baking them all the time!
Choclette says
Katie – Thank you. Yes, that substitute is most intriguing. I’m quite keen to try it in other things.
Katie says
Ohhh well done they look and sound lovely. Im intregied by the white chocolate instead of dripping idea. Never heard of that before, but much more appealing
Choclette says
Angela – teacakes was not something I’d considered before. But they are definitely on the menu for my virtual tea shop now.
Choclette says
Jac – I thought the white chocolate was a really good tip for us vegetarians.
LittleLoaf – it’s got me wondering about using it in pastry!!!!
Claire – you can certainly rely on Dan to come up with interesting and unusual methods – love it.
Susan – so pleased you enjoyed a virtual teacake with me.
Chele – now there’s an idea for a business – teacakes by post 🙂
MCB – how lovely. Toasted teacakes were something I missed out on when growing up. Now beginning to understand what it was all about.
Gardenteacakesandme says
Who could disagree with the comments above. Yes I too love hot toasted tea cakes with lashings of butter, perfection.
MissCakeBaker says
Toasted teacakes with lots of butter remind me of Saturday shopping trips with my mum and dad! Lovely.
Chele says
You are a total genius – and it is perfect weather for a few of these bad boys!! Couldn’t pop a few in the post could you?
;0)
Susan's blog says
Ohhhhh…I can smell them, I can taste the toastedness (s/p) and see the melted butter. Sheer joy! x
Rolling Pin Claire says
Where would we all be without a good Dan Lepard recipe to rely on? Love the reasoning behind using chocolate instead of beef dripping – love that about Dans recipes!
thelittleloaf says
I’m completely fascinated by the idea of using white chocolate instead of beef dripping…how interesting! I wonder what other recipes this would work in too…
Jacqueline says
They look wonderful and how intriguing to use white chocolate that way 🙂
Choclette says
Suelle – thank you. As it was my first ever attempt at tea cakes, I was really pleased with the result. But cinnamon buns are so good too – hard decision.
Kate – these teacakes are very highly recommended, although they’re not that sweet 😉
Misk – thank you for being kind – they did taste good, even if they didn’t look quite perfect!
Manu – thank you.
A Trifle Rushed – now that is a very good point. As a vegetarian it wouldn’t occur to me to ask if the tea cakes I was being offered were vegetarian :-S
Lucie – thank you.
Johanna – yes, I found that quite intriguing too. I think this has now become my sort of afternoon tea too :0
Foodycat – you can say the nicest of things, thank you.
Anna – thank you.
CC – cranberries worked brilliantly well – nothing like a bit of zing 😉
Laura – I know wet doughs produce really good bread and this was no exception, I just don’t know how to handle it. Although I did learn from this that the dough doesn’t really need much handling.
C – I didn’t show the picture of the really burnt ones, but they were pretty bad. Luckily didn’t affect the inside at all. These could certainly be a lot smaller and still be quite substantial. Don’t know how I managed a nice soft crumb, but I did.
Dom – is it going to be a midnight feast then?
Dom at Belleau Kitchen says
teacakes!… YES!… this is what I want now and off I pop to bake them… genius… I love your candied peel, so lovely… xx
C says
They’re a great teacake aren’t they! I used white chocolate in mine too, didn’t fancy the idea of dripping at all!!! I found that mine almost burnt on the top, and that was even after baking them at a slightly lower temp too, most frustrating.
From memory, I halved the recipe but made the same amount, and found that to be my ideal size – I had a good few breakfasts out of them. I don’t think my crumb was as soft as yours looks though, I can never get it quite as soft as I want it for sweet baked goods. I like your idea of adding raw cranberries too!
Laura@howtocookgoodfood says
I do love a teacake and love the idea of adding cranberries too. A wet dough is always a nightmare but then I use the excuse that it is bound to be so light when it’s cooked. It happened to me with Dan’s no knead loaf but seemed to sort itself out in the oven!
The Caked Crusader says
Love the addition of cranberry – that would really give a teacake some zing!
At Anna's kitchen table says
They look great!
Foodycat says
They look much better than any tea cake I have ever had!
Johanna GGG says
I’ve never thought of beef dripping and white chocolate as interchangeable – fascinating idea! These sound wonderful – just my sort of afternoon tea
Lucie says
Yum – they look so delicious!
A Trifle Rushed says
I always find a wet dough a challenge, and even though I’m not vegetarian I think I would use the chocolate rather then beef dripping, you just never know when a veggie friend might pop by!
manu says
These are so beautiful and yummy! Have a great Sunday
miskcooks.com says
What a picture! Absolutely lovely teacakes. 🙂
Kate@whatkatebaked says
Oh I do LOVE a good teacake! Freshly toasted, gathered in butter… This recipe had stood out for me as soon as I read it when I first got the book- really enjoyed reading how you got on with it! Thank you for your entry! PS guilty as charged with my sweet tooth!!
Suelle says
I was torn between these and the cinnamon buns I eventually made, for this month’s Tea Time Treats. It was the size that put me off these a bit, but the recipe sounded lovely and yours look really tasty!