Kim's Cooking and Gardening: Cinnamon Rolls

Ree Drummond (see the link on the right) says these are the best cinnamon rolls ever. They are. If you want to see her pictures and explanation, go to her link, but I’ve written it here too. They aren’t hard to make because there is no kneading.

These make a lot of rolls.

It’s easiest to make them in round aluminum pans. That way, you can give some away, freeze some, and you won’t tie up any of your regular baking pans. It makes about 7 pans of rolls. Your kitchen will smell wonderful. People would come from miles around just to sit in your kitchen and breathe. Then they will want to eat.

Cinnamon Rolls

1 quart Whole Milk

1 cup Vegetable Oil

1 cup Sugar

2 packages Active Dry Yeast (about 1 tablespoon)

9 cups (Plus 1 Cup Extra, Separated) All-purpose Flour or whole wheat, or a mixture

1 teaspoon (heaping) Baking Powder

1 teaspoon (scant) Baking Soda

1 Tablespoon Salt

2 c. Melted Butter

2 cups Sugar

¼ cup Cinnamon

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MAPLE FROSTING:

1 bag Powdered Sugar (2 lbs.)

1 tbs. Maple Flavoring

½ cups Milk

¼ cups Melted Butter

⅛ teaspoons Salt

Mix the milk, vegetable oil and sugar in a pan. “Scald” the mixture (heat until just before the boiling point). This is so the sugar can melt.

Turn off heat and leave to cool 45 minutes to 1 hour. When the mixture is lukewarm, 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.