Curing the Cinnamon Roll Crave

Earlier this year, I decided to make a change. To exercise regularly and eat healthier. I did so and managed to stick with the plan until now plus/minus the occasional cheats and special events. Before I started eating clean and exercising regularly, I was a glutton. Oh yes, I would just give in to my cravings like it was part of my meal time. One of my favourites are Aunty Anne's pretzel. I would get either their Sour Cream & Onion or Cinnamon Sugar or even BOTH *yikes*. Okay, so here's the deal. I love cinnamon.  I love brown sugar AND cinnamon. I love cinnamon rolls. Auntie Anne's in One Utama is located just opposite Cinnabon. But the thing is, I never did fancy Cinnabon although I loved cinnamon rolls. The icing just scares me. I did however tried it once but I found it too sweet.

Lately, with exams around the corner... and all stuffed in the house almost the whole day. You just can't help but try to find something to get you off track [deliberately]. The day before yesterday, I had the sudden craving for cinnamon rolls but the thing is, I didn't fancy Cinnabon (although they do smell terrific!) and these days I am not keen on Auntie Anne's either. Ever since I started eating clean, I cooked often and baked often. Especially baking because when you bake your own desserts or breads, you get to control the amount of ingredients that goes into the batter/dough etc. As I was saying, the cinnamon roll craving hit me so I decided to ask my friend for the recipe. She is amazing and so were her cinnamon rolls. She made a batch some weeks ago and it tasted so good, I just had to! My friend's recipe is adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction which she tweaked to suit her taste buds, and I tweaked to suit mine.

Cinnamon Rolls Recipe

yields: 9 -10 rolls approximately                       prep time: 3 hours                    cook time: 30 minutes

INGREDIENTS

Dough

2 1/2 cups high protein flour + 1/2 cup whole wheat flour (or 3 cups all purpose flour)
2 tbsps molasses sugar (a.k.a brown sugar)
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 tsps active dried yeast
120 ml water
60 ml skimmed milk
6 tbsps coconut oil (or 40 grams butter)
1 large egg

Filling
2tbsps ground cinnamon (or 3 tbsps butter)
40 grams molasses sugar 
2 tbsps coconut oil

Glaze
1/2 cup icing sugar
2 tbsps milk (or enough to form a smooth consistency)
1 tsp vanilla extract


DIRECTIONS

1. Dissolve the active dried yeast with a  pinch of sugar with 2 tbsps of lukewarm water. Mix until no lumps and let it sit at room temperature for 15 minutes, until it has bubbled and expanded.
2. Set aside 1/2 cup of flour, whisk the flour, sugar, salt and yeast together in a bowl until it combines to a rough paste. Mix in the water, milk and coconut oil. Add egg.
3. Sprinkle in the reserved flour,  by 1/4 cup increments, knead it until the dough is soft and it cleans the side and bottom of your bowl. The dough will be slightly sticky but not sticky enough to stick on your hands. It should have a slightly sticky surface and an elastic texture.
4. Lift the dough and lightly flour the same mixing bowl. Place the dough in and cover with clean dish towel. Let it rest for about 10 minutes.
5. While dough is resting, prepare the filling. Mix ground cinnamon, molasses sugar and coconut oil until well mixed, set aside.
6. After 10 minutes, roll dough out into a rectangle of about 14 x 8 inches on a flat surface.
7. Spread filling all over the dough, and roll dough up into a tight log.
8. Grease a baking pan, and cut the dough approximately 2 inches per section. To make the cutting easier and smoother, try greasing the knife with oil or as how I did, I dusted mine with flour and wipe the knife clean after each cut.
9. Place dough onto greased pan, cut side up, and cover with dish towel. Let rolls rise for about 1 - 1 1/2 hours until they have risen almost double.
10. Closer to the time when it has doubled in size (about 10 minutes before), preheat oven to 190 degree Celsius and bake for 25 - 30 minutes, or until the top are lightly browned.
11. Meanwhile, mix icing sugar, milk and vanilla. Stir everything together until there are no lumps in the sugar.
12. Right before serving, drizzle glaze over the rolls.

Mix all dough ingredients together in a mixing bowl.

Final product of dough after mixing all dough ingredients. Bouncy, Sticky & Elastic.

Filling: Mix molasses sugar, ground cinnamon & coconut oil.

Spread filling onto flat rolled out surface of dough. 

Roll tightly into log.

Cut approximately 2 inches each section. 

Grease pan & lay cinnamon rolls cut face up. Cover & let to rise for 1 - 1 1/2 hours.

Mix ingredients for the glaze.

Cinnamon rolls after baking! Doubled in size! :D

The aroma of cinnamon rolls baking was just heavenly! I was so excited and couldn’t wait for it to be done! I actually prefer it without the glaze because I added lots of cinnamon into it! I substituted butter with coconut oil because I didn’t have butter at home, and I was too lazy to head out just to get butter. Also, it is a healthier alternative using coconut oil. Plus, I found out that the texture of the bread was actually lighter as compared to using butter and less oily/greasy. However, coconut oil is quite pricey so I would suggest if you do not have any future plans for the coconut oil, just stick with butter.

I made sure not to include too much whole wheat flour as the bread will turn out rock hard! If you plan on making whole wheat bread and not cracking your teeth, mix it with all-purpose flour. The consistency of the plain flour to whole wheat flour was perfect because the rolls turned out fluffy and soft. It wasn't packed or heavy neither was it too filling. I plan on trying a healthier version than this, but it will require more work and more pure/natural ingredients.

Halfway through baking, I realised how easy it was to make cinnamon rolls. Even easier than baking cake IMO. I guess there will be more of this in the future! Save my money, save my waistline! ;) I modified the recipe a bit to make it "less" sinful also because I made do with the ingredients that I have in my kitchen.

Simply delightful!

A Sunday well spent indeed! :D Now...

*crawls back to exam notes*