Anyone LOVE the smell of cinnamon rolls hot from the oven? Ok, so is that a unanimous yes? Great. Anyone LOVE feeling guilty after eating a couple of them? Let’s face it, those straight-from-the-can cinnamon rolls are loaded with a lot more trans fat and high fructose corn syrup than nutrients. Care for a cinnamon roll recipe that at least has some nutritious, redeeming qualities? If you said yes, you have to make these.
These are my favorite thing to make when we have big groups of overnight guests, because I can make a big batch a day or two ahead of time. Pop them in the fridge and they’re ready to go in the morning. No waking up at 4 am to start from scratch and let them rise twice. Nope, just roll out of bed and in 45 minutes they’re DONE. You better believe this will become a Christmas Eve/Christmas Morning tradition in our home.
What you need
For the dough
3-3 ½ tsp. instant dry yeast
1 c. warm liquid (I used ½ c. skim milk, ½ c. water)
¼ c. softened butter
¼ c. honey
½ tsp. salt
2 eggs
1 ¾-2 ¼ c. all-purpose flour, divided
1 ¾ c. whole wheat flour
For the filling
¼ c. packed brown sugar
2 Tbsp. cinnamon, divided
½ tsp. allspice
¼ tsp. chili powder
½ tsp. nutmeg
½ c. chunky stuff (optional) You can use whatever you like: raisins, chopped nuts, or any other fixins
For the icing
1 c. powdered sugar, sifted
1 tsp. vanilla
5 or 6 tsp. skim milk
What you do
Remove the milk, butter and eggs from the fridge and let sit out to come to room temperature. Heat the 1 c. milk/water until warm. (You want it to be between 100-110F so it’s at optimal temperature for the yeast.)
Put the yeast and warm milk/water in a large bowl and let it do it’s thing for about 5 minutes or until foamy. Stir in butter, honey, salt and eggs. Add in 1 ¾ c. all-purpose flour and 1 ¾ c. whole wheat flour stirring until it feels like a soft dough. Lightly flour the countertop and your hands and knead dough for 5-10 minutes until smooth and elastic. Knead in as much of the remaining ½ c. all-purpose flour as needed to keep dough from sticking to your hands.
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| Before rising |
Grease a large bowl, place the dough ball in the bowl and turn it to coat all sides. Cover with a towel and let it rise until doubled (about an hour or so). Punch dough down and roll out on a floured surface. You want it to be about a 12x16 inch rectangle.
In a bowl, combine brown sugar and spices. Lightly grease the top of the dough with just a thin layer of melted butter, oil, or cooking spray. Sprinkle the sugar/spice mixture over the greased dough and then sprinkle on chopped nuts, raisins, etc on top, making sure to leave a ½ inch border with no filling.
Starting with the long side, roll the dough tightly into a long roll, pressing firmly with each roll. Pinch the seam to seal, using some water to make the seal stick if needed. Cut the dough roll into sections about 1 inch wide. This should give you about 16 cinnamon rolls.
Place the rolls, cut sides up, in a 9x13 inch baking pan or two 8 or 9 inch round baking pans coated with cooking spray. You want a ½ inch to 1 inch gap between rolls so they have room to rise. But if you are going to refrigerate them overnight before baking them in the morning, you need to make sure they aren’t far enough apart that they will deflate overnight.
Cover and let rise 45 minutes or until doubled in size again.
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| And after... |
If you’re planning on baking the cinnamon rolls now, preheat the oven to 375F, uncover rolls, and bake at 375 for 20-25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool in pan.
If you’re not baking them until the next day, cover rolls and refrigerate until the morning then uncover and let sit out to come to room temperature 30-60 minutes before you want to bake them. Then bake as instructed.
To prepare icing, stir powdered sugar and vanilla together then stir in milk, 1 tsp. at a time, stirring to form a thick glaze. Drizzle icing evenly over rolls. Soak those babies because you know they're better with the icing all in it.
