Ok so this super easy cinnamon rolls recipe was my first real attempt at making them, although I have had requests to make them for years! They turned out so delicious I really hope you try them. It’s worth the wait too, making the dough from scratch gives you time to get the cinnamon butter filling ready and also work on the absolutely delicious cream cheese filling – seriously I could eat that stuff on my own!
First up we make the dough, warm the milk in a small saucepan until just bubbling, remove from the heat and use the residual heat to melt the butter. So plonk in the butter and mix through until fully melted, then leave to cool.
In a separate larger bowl add ¾ Flour of the flour, the yeast, sugar and salt then mix through to combine with a spoon or whisk. Add in the wet ingredients – the water, egg, and slightly cooled milk butter mixture, stir well to incorporate. This will be quite a wet mix so once merge gradually add the remaining flour mix through until you have a thick consistent dough.
Flour a chopping board, plonk the dough down and knead away for a good 10 minutes, keep adding flour as necessary to stop it sticking. One you have a nice smooth dough, leave on the board and place a damp tea towel on top for about 25 minutes. Whilst the dough is proving with the damp towel over it….we make the filling.
The cinnamon filling is made by getting the room temperature butter, and beating it together in a mixing bowl with the dark brown sugar and cinnamon. This basically it, but beat it until smooth! No need to put it in the fridge really, keep it at room temperature until needed.
Once the dough has risen in size, remove the towel and roll out on a floured board into a big rectangle. Spread the cinnamon butter all over and sprinkle raisins (if using) on top. Roll up from the longer end into one long sausage shape and seal the ends by pinching together.
Using a sharp knife slice one inch discs of the cinnamon dough mix and place into a baking dish. The baking dish should be greased with a little butter and sprinkled with a little caster sugar if you want, this helps to caramelise the bottoms when baking!
Repeat with all of the cinnamon rolls and wedge into a baking tin. Put the damp tea towel over the tray again covering the rolls for 15 minutes. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until well browned and risen. The oven should be pre-heated to gas mark 5 or equivalent. Meanwhile make the cream cheese icing. Beat together the icing sugar, cream cheese and butter until smooth, tweaking to taste adding extra icing sugar, cheese or butter to your liking.
Once baked spread the cream cheese mix over the tops of the slightly cooled buns either in the tin together or individually – then simply serve up!