What’s your flavour? Zeelandia
UK explores the
2025 Hot Cross Bun Bakery market.
At Zeelandia UK, we are passionate about Easter, supplying industrial and craft bakers all around the country with technical expertise, alongside a supply of high-quality bakery ingredients.
One of these ingredients is Exakt Zest, our well-established and high-yield sweet dough concentrate, which is mixed with flour, yeast and water to create zesty, aromatic, soft and fluffy Hot Cross Buns, as well as other favourite Easter bakery treats like rich and fruity tea breads and even Panettone.
Each year, our bakery experts explore the latest trends for Hot Cross Buns allowing us to deliver insight to our customers and inspire their creativity.
Fruitier and sweeter than ever.
Traditional Hot Cross Buns are known for their spiced fruity aroma and succulent fruit-filled dough loaded with sultanas, raisins, currants, and citrus peel.
This year, number one on Good Housekeeping’s ‘Traditional’ Hot Cross Bun list is none other than Waitrose’s Richly Fruited range, boasting 33% mixed vine fruits compared to 24% mixed vine fruits on their essential range.
While it appears the fruitier the better for consumers, we are also seeing creative adaptions with other popular spring flavours, such as blueberries, mixed berries and lemon zest.
The Independent voted Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Triple Berry Hot Cross Buns their favourite on the market, made with sultanas, dried sweetened cranberries, blueberries and currants.
While a wider range of fruit content can help appeal to new audiences, substitution or blending fruit ingredients can also be a good creative tactic for bakers concerned about rising costs of vine fruit. Needless to say, fruit-filled buns are still the flagship of the Hot Cross Bun Market.
Growth in nostalgic and savoury HXB flavours.
Several years ago, twists on the popular easter treat were considered ‘untraditional’ and ‘unnecessary’, but year after year, younger consumers have become fascinated by combinations of new and nostalgic (newstalgia) flavours, such as ‘Sticky Toffee Pudding’ and ‘Triple Chocolate’ or even ‘Millionaire’ buns.
At Zeelandia UK, our Pure Caramel with its soft and creamy texture could be injected into a future Hot Cross Bun recipe, to add an extra layer of sensory pleasure and indulgence.
On the savoury side, there are an abundance of new Hot Cross Buns incorporating cheese, garlic, chilli and onion all creating a new eating occasion where rather than being served as a sweet breakfast or afternoon treat, Hot Cross Buns can be used as an alternative sandwich carrier for the lunchbox.
Creative bakes from Craft Bakers
Just a little scroll through our Instagram and we can see the passion, love and creativity craft bakers are applying to their Hot Cross Buns and Easter products in 2025.
Pophams’ signature hot cross bun is a great example of breaking the mould while utilising existing ingredients, using repurposed croissant dough laminated for a crunchy cross and mincemeat leftover from the bakery’s Christmas range.
Other examples include cream-filled, giant and even tray-bake style products on offer.
Talk to us about your next Hot Cross Bun Creation!
While Easter 2025 is almost here, we are excited to talk to industrial and craft bakers about ideas for 2026 production and how our Exakt Zest sweet-dough concentrate can be the perfect addition to your Easter recipes, with excellent tolerance and natural flavours.
We also offer a wide-range of sweet fillings & toppings for you to get creative with traditional, new and delicious flavours.
