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Hello Friends!

Growing up, my dad was famous for his his cinnamon rolls and his doughnuts. Turns out, he was using the same formula for both. The summer I turned 18, I asked him to teach me how to make them. He did, and so began my love affair with viennoiserie.

This isn’t my dad’s formula. This is mine. I spent multiple years making this formula what I wanted it to be, and I am proud of it. To be completely honest, I have built my reputation as a baker in large part from this formula.

A more creative way I have used this formula was when I paired it with vanilla bean frozen yogurt and featured it as a sticky bun sundae on my dessert menu.

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If you were to simply bake this as a plain loaf, you would discover it is remarkably similar to a Portuguese sweet bread. A little orange zest, maybe the seeds scraped from a vanilla bean, and this would be a fragrant loaf perfect for toast, or even bread pudding.

A personal opinion: many highly skilled pastry chefs I have worked with prefer brioche for their cinnamon roll dough. I don’t. Cinnamon rolls are distinctly an American viennoiserie, and brioche is a distinctly French dough. As best I have been informed, cinnamon is not well esteemed in Europe. Keep these true to their origin. Keep them authentic. Use the sweet dough.

18 grams instant yeast

102 grams blood temperature water

70 grams granulated sugar

8 grams honey

167 grams butter

445 grams bread flour

55 grams cake flour

10 grams salt

45 grams egg yolks

167 grams whole milk

I would like to offer a few observations about this formula: first, 18 grams of instant yeast is very high. This is in part because of the high ratio of sugar (more than 15% of the weight of the flour), and in part to allow this dough to be kept frozen. It freezes beautifully, for up to 12 days. Also, ten percent of the flour is cake flour. This keeps the dough from being too chewy, even with full gluten development. Finally, about that sugar: the addition of honey prevents the granulated sugar from drying out the dough. Without the honey, this dough can seem dry. If there is no honey on hand, corn syrup will also do the trick.

Start by mixing the yeast and the warm water in a small bowl. Set it aside while measuring the remaining ingredients.

In the mixing bowl, cream together the sugar, honey, and butter. Once the butter has picked up the sugar and honey, and looks evenly incorporated, add the flours, salt, egg yolks, and milk. Pour the yeast water on top.

Now, mix the dough to a proper gluten development. In a stand mixer, this can be done with either the paddle attachment or the dough hook. For this specific formula, I prefer the paddle, and that’s not normally my choice for yeast dough. You know you have proper gluten development when you can stretch the dough into a thin sheet between your fingers, without it tearing. I would anticipate roughly seven minutes of mixing time to achieve this, half on low speed and half ounce low-medium speed.

Now, let the dough rest until it has doubled in size. If the cinnamon rolls aren’t being made until the next day, this dough will do fine resting in the refrigerator overnight, and will be easier to shape when the dough is cold.

To shape the dough, roll it out into a rectangle that’s roughly a 3/8 of an inch thick, and 7 inches wide. Brush the length of the dough with heavy cream, and spread generously with a cinnamon sugar. Be sure to leave about a half inch edge the length of the dough that is clean. This will allow the dough roll to seal itself.

For my cinnamon sugar, I use equal parts light brown sugar, granulated sugar, and cinnamon to taste. At home, this would be roughly 1 cup light brown sugar, 1 cup granulated sugar, and a couple tablespoons of a nice Saigon cinnamon.

The reason I brush with heavy cream instead of butter is to prevent gaps between the rings of dough during the baking process. This isn’t the most common choice: many bakers do brush with butter. I would never turn down a cinnamon roll over this, but again, I prefer the tighter look butter can’t give.

Beginning at one end, and working the length of the dough, roll the dough into a spiral. When completed, there should be a log of dough, with a spiral of cinnamon sugar running through it.

Now it’s time to cut the log. This formula will yield 16, 2.5 ounce rolls. So the best way to cut the rolls an even size is to divide the log in half, then in quarters, then divide each quarter into quarters.

There are a couple of ways to proceed from here; the buns can be spaced out on a baking pan, proofed, and baked. This will give nice round rolls with their own distinct crust. This is a common practice in many bakeries. Another option, one I prefer, is to arrange the rolls close to each other in several pie tins, or loaf pans. This will force the rolls to proof higher, and into each other. It won’t give an individual round roll, but one that is more cakey, almost crustless, and has to be cut apart from the others. This gives more of a shopping-mall type cinnamon roll. In any case, there are no wrong choices here, just personal preference.

Finally, brush the rolls with egg wash. Cover with a tea towel, and leave sitting at room temperature until the rolls have doubled in size.

Bake in a 375 degree oven, if you are baking these as individual rolls. I would anticipate 13-15 minutes for a bake time, but do realize that ovens all have their own personalities.

My standard glaze for cinnamon rolls is very simple. 1 pound of powdered sugar mixed with 3 ounces (6 Tablespoons) of hot water is very easy, and forms a nice glaze. It’s okay to be more creative, of course. Maple glaze and orange buttercream are nice choices, and I knew of a lady many years ago who liked her cinnamon rolls topped with chocolate glaze.