Curry & naan Chelsea buns
When I was noodling around with this idea, a dessert loving friend said: “I don't know about making it work but if you offer me a Chelsea bun and then give me that, there will be trouble”, which I personally think is all the intro this recipe needs.
It's a Chelsea bun, with saag paneer inside.
Ingredients:
Makes 12 good sized ones, but you can get 16 dinky buffet bites out of this quantity, just about.
There’s a bunch of technique & ingredients notes at the end.
For the bread dough:
Strong white bread flour, 400g
Wholemeal flour (ideally also strong), 100g
Caster sugar, 40g
Salt, 10g
Butter, 40g (room temperature makes this easier)
Eggs, 2 (medium)
Single cream, 150g
Water, 100ml
Nigella seeds, 1/4tsp
Black mustard seeds, 1/4tsp
Ground coriander, 1/4tsp
Yeast, 1x7g sachet or a little bit more than whatever dried yeast you have in the cupboard recommends for this much flour
For the curry filling:
One quantity of my saag paneer recipe, omitting the tofu.
Cheese, 100g
(ideally paneer, I use lactofree mature cheddar here, and a mix would work)Mango chutney, about 3tbsp
I'm sorry to do the "one quantity" back reference bollocks, but it really is just that. Do use the “optional” chilli if you can - these benefit from it. You could also use leftovers from your favourite takeout place.
Instructions:
Mix the flours, sugar, salt, spices, and yeast. Cube the butter small and add it.
Add the liquids and work it together into a dough. You can do this by hand, I use a stand mixer. Either way, bring it together until the butter is worked in and then either in the mixer with a dough hook or on a floured worktop, knead the hell out of it until you're happy you've got that silky elastic texture that's hard to explain. You can try to do the window pane thing if you like - sorry about the wholegrains.
Put the dough in a bowl, cover it (I use cling film) and leave it somewhere warm to rise for about an hour, or - as I am compelled to add so as not to offend the gods - “until doubled in bulk”.
While it's rising, make the sag paneer and leave it to cool a little.
Do not add the tofu. Really. That will not be a nice time.
Cut the cheese into small dice, maybe a half cm. Bigger won't hurt but it does roll easier with small.
Tip the dough out onto a floured surface and roll it out straight as you can, into a roughly 50cm/30cm rectangle.
Spread the spinach mix over it evenly and scatter over the cheese.
Roll it up into a tight spiral from the long side, so the final thing is about 50cm long. Trim off the very ends, and cut the roll into clean 3-4cm slices.
Arrange these in a greased baking tin with a little space between them so they can smoosh together fetchingly as they rise and bake with the whole tear and share thing going on.
Cover them and set to prove for an hour or so (warm space again) until they've risen and grown together.
Heat the oven to 200c and bake them for about 20 mins. Check them a bit before that - we don't want them too dark.
In a bowl, beat together the mango chutney with about 1tbsp of water, or to an easy, quite liquid brushing consistency.
Take the buns out of the oven and gently brush them with the chutney syrup, then leave them to cool.
They're gently absurd, and a bit of a faff, but they make a nice buffet piece. Other curry fillings would probably work - a lamb keema is the obvious one, but I'm also gonna throw it out here: cauliflower cheese?
In fact, my working hypothesis is that if it makes a daft but tasty cheese toastie, it'll make an equally daft but tasty Chelsea bun. The principle certainly holds for a Reuben sandwich.
Notes
Proving: One thing to consider with this kind of enriched dough, especially if you're rolling it (the joylessness of which I breezily glossed over) is an overnight prove in the fridge. You'll get a richer flavour, but need a longer second rise as the yeast wakes up.
Proving: Here's a fun thing if it's cold inside. Prove the dough in an unheated oven with a big dish of hot water (boiled and cooled a little) on the oven floor. I have no idea how much, probably about 500ml at about 80c? Put it to one side if you can so it's not directly under the dough. The oven will insulate, holding the heat and you've just basic bitch MacGyver'd a proving drawer.
Flour: The wholemeal is here for a bit of body. You can use all white or more wholemeal. I’m not sure how well it would work with more than about 50% - the texture could end up a bit coarse.
Naan: No, this is not actually a naan bread dough, and with all the spices it’s more like a supermarket naan than a restaurant one. But it's enriched as balls to replace the butteriness and you could probably swap the cream for the same weight of yoghurt and a bit more water.
Spinach: About 600g of frozen spinach (frozen weight) defrosted and squeezed will see you right here, if you’re not sure about quantities.
Glazing: If you do a couple of rounds of chutney syrup glazing the buns will get more of the iconic Chelsea stickiness, and more sweet/savoury contrast but it's really up to you.