Christmas is apporaching!

I love Christmas! I love everything about Christmas, the decorations, the Christmas carols, the food and desserts..of course, but most of all I love that it's the time of year when we spend a lot of time with friends and family. This weekend me and my mom went to my grandmothers to bake "Lussekatter". It's a saffron bun which is strongly associated with Christmas in Sweden. We bake and eat it during the entire month of December and since it's December very soon, I thought it's about time to get started with the Christmas preparations.

The saffron gives the bun this beautiful yellow colour.

Lussekatter/Saffron buns, 30pcs

150g butter
5 dl milk, 3%
50 g yeast
1 g saffron
2 dl sugar
1 egg
1 tsp salt
1,5 l flour approx.

egg and raisins for garnishing

Melt the butter and add the milk to lukewarm (37 degrees C).

Crumble the yeast into a bowl, add the salt and then pour the butter and milk mix over it and let the yeast melt while stirring (if you are using dry yeast, blend it with the flour instead).

Add saffron, sugar, egg and about half the flour (make sure you have no lumps in the flour before adding it to the liquid dough). Work the dough until smooth and easy and then add the rest of the flour.

Maybe you need to add more or less flour than in this recipe, you have to add enough flour so the dough nearly lets go of the bowl. It's not supposed to be too sticky, but still if you add too much flour the buns will be dry. It's better to have a bit too little flour at this point and add more if needed when you form the buns. Spread some flour on top of the dough and cover with a clean kitchen towel. Let it rise to double its size. It takes about 1 hour.

Put the dough onto the floured pastry board and work the dough a few minutes. Take a small piece of dough and roll it to a S-shaped bun or the shape you prefer.

Here are a few examples of how you can form the buns. The most popular shape is the S-shape.
Preheat the oven to 225 degrees Celsius.

Put the buns on a non-stick oven paper on an oven tray and let it rise again for about 20-30 minutes.


Brush with whisked egg and then garnish at top and bottom of each S with raisins. If you add the raisins first and then brush the buns with whisked egg, the raisins will fall out, during the fermentation.

Bake in oven for about 5-10 minutes depending on size, until golden.


Let them cool down a little bit before settling down to enjoy your treat!

   Johanna ♥