Bath Buns

There's a particular kind of grey weekend afternoon, the sort where the light goes flat by three and the rain settles in for the duration, that asks for something yeasted in the oven. Bath Buns are the answer. The kitchen fills with the smell of warm butter and lemon and bread, the windows fog gently, and for a few hours nothing else needs your attention.

These aren't fashionable. Bath Buns belong to a slower tradition: Georgian tea tables, the kind of bun you ate in a pump room with a cup of strong tea. Rich with butter and eggs, studded with candied peel and sultanas, sometimes scented with caraway, always topped with crushed sugar nibs that bake into a glittering, crackling crown. Sweeter and denser than you might expect. They are not a breakfast roll. They are a pudding pretending to be bread.

The sugar on top is the point. When you bite in, the nibs crack between your teeth and dissolve into the soft, buttery crumb beneath. It's a small, specific pleasure. I wrote it down in the notebook once after a wet Saturday in March: "Bath Buns. Tea. The afternoon saved." That was the whole entry.

Make these when you have a few hours and the inclination to be at home. They reward attention but ask very little technique. A recipe is a conversation, not a contract. Skip the caraway if it isn't your thing. Use currants instead of sultanas. The dough won't mind. There are few better feelings than putting a warm plate of these in front of someone with a pot of tea between you.