Raise your hand if you watched the Pioneer Woman make cinnamon rolls on her Christmas special!
Yeah, me too.
I've followed the PW since I started blogging in 2008. And back then she was famous for her cinnamon rolls. She still is!
I've wanted to make these since I first read her recipe all those years ago. I was terrified. Why? It involved yeast. Rising. Dough. Sccccarrrrry.
But, after watching her make them on the food network, I thought, I can do that! And I did!
I have a few tips for you if you're wanting to make these gooey, delicious rolls. Everything always looks SO much easier on TV than it really is, no? So, here are my trial and errors for ya:
1.) Use a BIG counter.
Seriously, the biggest space you have. Some of my twitter friends said they used their dining room tables. I started rolling out half of my dough on the counter that I usually use. What a bad idea. First, I sterilized the counter because I'm a freak like that. Then I rolled it out, put the butter, sugar and cinnamon on it and started to roll it up. It was too long for the counter and as I rolled, everything dripped out, onto my cabinets and the floor. Gross. Gooey. MESS. So, I stopped, cleaned everything up and then had to sterilize another counter.
2.) Melt 2 extra sticks of butter.
You have to add melted butter to the pan. I ended up stopping and starting to melt extra butter just for this purpose. If you have too much, just use it in your icing.
3.) Let em' rise.
The recipe says to let them rise for 20 minutes. I highly recommend letting them rise longer than that (this is after they are sliced and in the pan). I let mine rise about 35 minutes and they were big and beautiful.
4.) You can omit and freeze.
I don't like coffee. So, as a tip, you can leave the coffee out of the icing. I just added a little more milk to compensate. Also, you can freeze them. I baked them, iced them and the froze some. You could also freeze the icing separately too.
And for good measure, I'll repost her recipe here. Note - this recipe made 9 pans for me. Also, I made the dough 2 days before I actually made the rolls.
Pioneer Woman’s Cinnamon Rolls
Ingredients
1 quart Whole Milk
1 cup Vegetable Oil
1 cup Sugar
2 packages Active Dry Yeast
8 cups (Plus 1 Cup Extra, Separated) All-purpose Flour
1 teaspoon (heaping) Baking Powder
1 teaspoon (scant) Baking Soda
1 Tablespoon (heaping) Salt
Plenty Of Melted Butter
2 cups Sugar
Generous Sprinkling Of Cinnamon
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MAPLE FROSTING:
1 bag Powdered Sugar
2 teaspoons Maple Flavoring
½ cups Milk
¼ cups Melted Butter
¼ cups Brewed Coffee
⅛ teaspoons Salt
Preparation Instructions
Mix the milk, vegetable oil and sugar in a pan. Scald the mixture (heat until just before the boiling point). Turn off heat and leave to cool 45 minutes to 1 hour. When the mixture is lukewarm to warm, but NOT hot, sprinkle in both packages of Active Dry Yeast. Let this sit for a minute. Then add 8 cups of all-purpose flour. Stir mixture together. Cover and let rise for at least an hour.
After rising for at least an hour, add 1 more cup of flour, the baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir mixture together. (At this point, you could cover the dough and put it in the fridge until you need it – overnight or even a day or two, if necessary. Just keep your eye on it and if it starts to overflow out of the pan, just punch it down).
When ready to prepare rolls: Sprinkle rolling surface generously with flour. Take half the dough and form a rough rectangle. Then roll the dough thin, maintaining a general rectangular shape. Drizzle 1/2 to 1 cup melted butter over the dough. Now sprinkle 1 cup of sugar over the butter followed by a generous sprinkling of cinnamon.
Now, starting at the opposite end, begin rolling the dough in a neat line toward you. Keep the roll relatively tight as you go. Next, pinch the seam of the roll to seal it.
Spread 1 tablespoon of melted butter in a seven inch round foil cake or pie pan. Then begin cutting the rolls approximately ¾ to 1 inch thick and laying them in the buttered pans.
Repeat this process with the other half of the dough. Let the rolls rise for 20 to 30 minutes, then bake at 400 degrees (see note below) until light golden brown, about 15 to 18 minutes.
For the frosting, mix together all ingredients listed and stir well until smooth. It should be thick but pourable. Taste and adjust as needed. Generously drizzle over the warm rolls. Go crazy and don’t skimp on the frosting.
Note: My rolls don’t work for me at 400 degrees anymore. I now bake them at 375 degrees.
