Cinnamon Rolls

After my bout of insomnia this very late last Saturday night or early Sunday morning, whichever your perspective is of 3 am, I had posted on FB about my family reaping rewards of fresh cinnamon rolls for breakfast from my lack of sleep, I was asked for that recipe too. This time when I duplicated it, I took pictures for you to see. You are going to want to slip off your rings as your hands will get goopy with this recipe.

The dough is not my own recipe, but is found in the Healthy Bread in 5 Minutes a Day book. I just love this book and the other book they have Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day. It is absolutely the easiest bread to make and worth your time to hope over and check it out. I just used the basic dough master recipe. They do have sweet roll dough recipes too.


First for your benefit I've laid out all the ingredients, other than the dough. You will need butter(or oil-typically I use canola or safflower, however, we are out right now so they get butter, not a big deal), sugar, cinnamon, almond meal.
The almond meal is just almonds that are ground up very fine, not to the point of almond flour. I do use this like almond flour though too. This adds some extra protein to the rolls and some calcium.


I take a chunk of dough out of my dish and roll it out into a rectangle. The approximate size of a 9 x 13 pan.




After melting about 2.5-3 Tablespoons of butter in the microwave, I pour that over the dough and spread it out, yes, I use my hands, they've been washed first.


Follow that with a scant 1/4 cup of sugar sprinkled over the top.




Cinnamon goes on next.

The final touch to the filling is the almond meal. My kids don't really like chopped nuts on their rolls, however, they will do the almond meal so they get the almond meal. You can make them without the almond meal and they taste just fine too.

Then you roll the dough up like a play-dough snake. This is the only type of snake that I'll get near and that won't scare the liver out of me.




Make sure that you pinch the outside edge to the roll to seal it.

I cut the snake in 1/2 first, then 1/2 again which if you are doing the math-I know you don't want to do math, but I'm a home school mom so math it is-you will now have a snake cut into 1/4ths.

Each 1/4 then gets cut into 1/3rds so that when all the cutting is done you will have 12 pieces.






I used to place these in a 9 x 13 French Corningware dish, however, the last couple times I've used my deep dish Pampered Chef stone.




I place the dish in the oven and set the convection heat to 170 degrees. If you don't have convection, then the regular oven at the same temperature works fine, it may take a bit longer for them to raise. You will want to let them double in size. If the dough is cold it takes about 30-45 minutes. I'm pretty laid back about and don't freak out about the times, that would be why I can't tell you specifics.


When they have doubled, approximately, then boost the temperature up to 350 degrees and bake until golden on top and when you tap them they sound hollow. I think it takes about 15-20 minutes, I wasn't watching precisely as I was busy loading the kids "workfiles". I was also making the glaze for them. This is the hardest part. Not really, but I had to let you think so.

You dump about 1 cup of powdered sugar in a bowl, add a splash(approximately 1 teaspoon) of vanilla or almond, whichever strikes your fancy. This next part is the tricky part, actually this is true.
You need to a just a touch of water as well. Stir this all up and you want the icing to be thick, not a glop that you can't move(see the picture on the right), but thick, like you need to push it off the spoon with your finger or another spoon. If it is too runny then it all runs off the warm cinnamon rolls.



The thick icing will just melt over the top.














The smell wafting through the house by now has worked it magic and the kids are waking up and coming downstairs with smiles on their faces.


If you want to make these fancy you can make the cream cheese frosting. I'll include that here, but without the pictures. This is how I usually make them for birthday breakfasts and holidays. This will make enough for a couple batches and that is with a loaded top. I will fill up a decorating bag or the fancy pump thing from Pampered Chef to swirl the icing on. 8 ounces of cream cheese, 1/4 cup butter softened, 4 cups powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla and 2 teaspoons of milk. Place all of this in my Kitchen Aid mixer bowl and whip up until smooth.

Enjoy all and have a great morning!! Oh be sure to make some coffee or hot chocolate to go with these, that makes it even better. I'm hoping that you don't get insomnia before you get to try this recipe.

Anita
PS. They are quickly carried off and all 12 are gone tonight.