New Zealand's love affair with hot cross buns is stronger than ever, and as Easter draws near, Tauranga supermarket bakeries are preparing for an onslaught of sales.

In the lead up to the annual celebration in April, Countdown is anticipating customers will devour 11 million of the spiced and glazed treats this year.

Countdown Bureta manager James Liddell with a large tray of freshly baked hot cross buns. Photo: Bruce Barnard.

More than five million individual hot cross buns have been gobbled up already since they hit the shelves, and a further six million are expected to be sold in the lead up to Easter weekend.

Countdown Bureta manager James Liddell doesn't have any exact figures, but says the bakery staff will more than earn their keep by 'selling a fair few” in the weeks to come.

'As we are getting close to Easter, it's really starting to ramp up,” says James, who first started selling the buns back in February.

Most popular are the traditional spiced fruit buns, but Hershey's chocolate buns are hot on their heels and fast becoming a modern favourite. The fruitless buns are the third most popular across the country.

'I would say the good old traditional hot cross bun is the most popular,” he adds, 'but the chocolate one is popular amongst the children.

'There is nothing like heating it up in the oven and putting a bit of butter on it.”

Across town Mount Maunganui New World owner Alan Rudkin says two key bread suppliers pulling the pin on hot cross buns in recent years means the in-store bakery is running red hot.

Last year Goodman Fielder opted out of supplying hot cross buns, as did Tip Top - a move Alan puts down to dollar bread.

'It's around this whole dollar bread category,” explains Alan, 'where they are baking so much dollar bread they don't have the capacity to do hot cross buns.

'One other company is doing hot cross buns for us so they are going to be doing very well this year. And our in-store bakeries are going to be gearing up massively to cater for the offset loss in supply.”

But hot cross buns aren't the only sweet treat Kiwis are tucking into this Easter.

Countdown anticipates Kiwis will also purchase around half-a-million loose chocolate eggs in the lead up to the public holiday. This doesn't include boxed eggs and other Easter products.

In keeping with a competitive Easter tradition, this month each Countdown bakery took part in the annual competition to be crowned ‘Hot Cross Bun Bakery of the Year'.

This year Christchurch is the home of New Zealand's best hot cross buns, with the top honour claimed by bakers at Countdown Northlands. Countdown Mt Roskill and Countdown Botany took out a close second and third place.

All 174 Countdown stores submitted their best buns to a panel who judged the Easter treats on visual appeal, the crossing and internal appearance, crumb texture, fruit quantity, overall quantity, volume and, perhaps most importantly, taste.

'Our bakers battle it out each year for the bragging rights,” says Countdown bakery merchandise manager Alton Gullery.

'It gets very competitive, with people putting a lot of time and effort into perfecting the secret Countdown hot cross bun recipe.”