Almost as good as that expensive store in the mall, which I won’t name. These are less expensive and you don’t need to stop eating at one. There is a recipe in our house that I’ve been playing with. So far, everyone loves these and they are reasonably easy, especially if you have a bread machine.
I have noticed that there is a difference between butter and margarine. Using butter in the bread dough gives it a delicate texture without being crusty greasy. But using margarine in the filling and frosting makes it more sweet. So I selected margarine and butter in specific places below.
BTW, “tsp” means teaspoon and “tbsp” means tablespoon. Read carefully.
Bread machine dough:
- 1 cup water
- 4 cups bread flour
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1 3/4 tsp salt
- 1 stick butter (room temperature, slightly mushy)
- 1/4 cup dry milk
- 2 eggs
- 2 tsp yeast
Dump all the above items at once into the bread machine and run the dough cycle (mix and knead, not bake). Take the dough out of the machine and roll it out thin on a flat surface like a clean countertop. Aim for a rectangle of bread dough that is approximately 12″ x 24″. It’s OK if it isn’t a perfect rectangle. Plan ahead to take the margarine and butter (all 3 1/2 sticks) and cream cheese out of the fridge in plenty of time to warm to room temperature.
Filling:
Take 1 1/2 sticks of margarine (room temperature, slightly mushy) and evenly spread it across the entire dough surface using a spatula or similar. Go all the way to the edges. In a bowl mix 2 cups brown sugar and 3 tbsp cinnamon (ground). Brown sugar works much better than white granulated sugar, and common ground cinnamon is fine. Use a fork to mix them together and break up the brown sugar lumps by squishing it. Dump the mixture on the buttered dough surface and evenly spread it around the entire surface with a spatula or similar, all the way to the edges.
Roll up the dough, using the long side of the rectangle. Keep the roll reasonably tight instead of saggy. When done, you should have a roll that is 24″ long and about 3″ in diameter. Using a steak knife or other good cutting instrument that cuts without too much squishing or ripping, gently cut the roll into sections about 1 3/4 inches wide. Gently place the pieces into a greased baking pan so the filling doesn’t fall out. It should fill about two 9×9 pans, or one 9×13 plus a bit extra. Give the dough time to rise, so that the rolls in the pan are starting to touch each other. Placing the pans in a 150 degree oven may help the rising process. If the rolls are placed too far apart or fail to rise, then the filling will run out and pool on the bottom of the pan.
Bake the rolls at about 385 degrees until the the bread dough on top starts to get nicely toasty brown. Take them out of the oven to cool a bit. Let them cool inside the cooking pans, they will soak up some of the melted filling. While they are cooling, work on the frosting.
Frosting:
- 3 oz of cream cheese (room temperature, almost half of a standard 8 oz package)
- 1 stick of margarine
- 1 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/8 tsp salt
Put all these ingredients into a bowl and blend with a motorized mixer until it changes from dusty clumpy to smooth moist frosting.
After the rolls go from hot to warm, apply the frosting. If you put the frosting on while hot, the frosting will melt completely, which probably isn’t what you want. Eat them soon after applying the frosting, while they are still warm. All of them, which is why some friends or neighbors should be present or within delivery distance. This ain’t health food, it’s happy food.