cinnabon cinnamon buns

When I was a kid, my mom always brought me over to the Cinnabon in the mall and I would watch them make cinnamon buns.  As a kid, that is 100% what I wanted to do as a job when I grew up.  Weirdly enough though, I don’t think I’ve ever made cinnamon buns until now! Anyway, a craving struck and I decided it was finally time to make my childhood dream come true!  The recipe I decided to use is from a book called More Top Secret Recipes: More Fabulous Kitchen Clones of America’s Favourite Brand-Name Foods which I found on a food blog called Jo Cooks.  Looked legit so I decided this would be the one to try and I was not disappointed.

It does take some time, but it’s worth it.  I wanted these as an afternoon snack but it ended up being a dessert after dinner so just keep in mind these need to rise twice. The recipe also says to bake for 20 minutes but at 20, mine were far from being done and I think I ended up baking them for almost 35 minutes.  So maybe just take a peek at 20 minutes but I would say baking time is more like 30 minutes.  I did make a couple of other minor adjustments but overall I mostly stuck to the original recipe.

Makes 12 cinnamon buns.

For the buns: 2 and 1/4 tsp active dry yeast / 1 cup lukewarm milk / 1/2 cup granulated sugar / 1/3 cup unsalted butter, room temperature / 1 tsp salt / 2 large eggs / 4 cups all-purpose flour (*may need more if your dough is too wet) /

For the filling: 1 cup brown sugar, packed / 3 tbsp ground cinnamon / 1/3 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

For the frosting: 6 tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature / 1 and 1/2 cups icing sugar / 1/4 cup cream cheese, room temperature / 1/2 tsp vanilla extract / 1/8 tsp salt

In a bowl, dissolve the yeast in the warm milk (I just heated up the milk in the microwave and you want it just a bit above body temperature but not too hot as to kill the yeast).  Add in 1 tsp of the sugar and let it bloom for about 5 to 10 minutes.  It should start to bubble a little bit.

In your mixing bowl, mix the sugar, flour, butter, salt and eggs until well combined.

Add in the yeast/milk mixture and use the dough hook to mix and knead the dough.  My dough was too wet and very sticky so if you experience the same, add just a little more flour, bit by bit, until you get a smooth dough.

Cover the bowl with clingfilm and place the bowl somewhere a bit warm (I always put my doughs in a cupboard in the study) to rise for at least an hour or until it has roughly doubled in size.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough out into a rough rectangle about 16 inches long x 12 inches wide and 1/4 inches thick.  Spread the butter for the filling evenly across the dough.

Combine the brown sugar and cinnamon in a bowl and then spread that all over top of the butter.

And now it’s time to roll! Working from the long side, gently roll the dough with your hands from top to bottom.  Then, using a sharp knife, cut the dough into 1 and 1/2 inch slices. Place the slices into a parchment paper-lined baking dish.  The recipe calls for a 9 x 13 inch pan, which we don’t have so we just used a large roasting pan but that worked perfectly fine.

Cover with clingfilm and let it rise again for about 30 minutes to 1 hour or until the buns have roughly doubled in size.  In the meantime, preheat the oven to 350F.  When the buns have risen, bake for about 30 to 35 minutes or until golden brown.  The original recipe does say to bake for just 20 minutes so I would suggest you just check every now and again after 20 minutes to make sure you don’t over-cook the buns.

While the buns are baking, you can make the cream cheese frosting.  Put all the ingredients for the frosting into a mixing bowl and using a paddle attachment, mix until the frosting is light and fluffy.

When the buns are finished baking, let them cool just a little bit (or not – it’s hard to resist fresh out of the oven cinnamon buns!) and top with the frosting. SO GOOD.

Something I’ll try next time is prepping the buns so they’re ready to bake first thing in the morning.  The recipe I used says that after you’ve gotten to the step where you’ve rolled the dough and sliced it up into the buns, you can cover with clingfilm and just let it complete the second rise as a cold rise in the fridge overnight.  Then in the morning, you can pick up where you left and bake them off.  Would be great to have these freshly baked for breakfast!

halloumi burger with lemon-herb mayo

My sister recently reminded me of halloumi burgers when she tagged me in a new Burger King Sweden promotion for one.  She knows I love cheese!  And especially fried cheese.  I actually did have a halloumi burger once… and actually in Sweden!  I remember it well as it was on my birthday 7 years ago in Stockholm at a cute outdoor restaurant.  It was amazing so I don’t know why I haven’t tried making one myself in all these years.  Especially since we’re now in Saudi Arabia where halloumi is everywhere.  Anyway, I finally did and it was delicious.  Decided to do a lemon-herb mayo to go with it and it worked really well.  Rock wasn’t fully on board when I told him what I’d be making for dinner but he ended up eating the kids’ scraps.

450 grams halloumi cheese  /  about 3/4 cup all-purpose flour  /  4 burger buns  /  1/3 cup mayonnaise  /  1 tbsp fresh lemon juice  /  1 tbsp finely chopped fresh parsley  /  chopped romaine lettuce for topping  /  sliced fresh tomato for topping  /  oil for frying (I used vegetable oil)

First you can quickly whip up the sauce by just combining the mayo, lemon juice and parsley.

Then slice the halloumi into 4 fat, like basically, steaks of cheese.  Heat up your oil over medium heat in a large frying pan. You just need enough oil to come up about halfway of the height of the cheese.  Pour the flour onto a plate and press the halloumi into the flour and thoroughly coat all over.  When the oil is ready (hot but not so hot that it browns the cheese super fast), slide the halloumi into the oil.  Fry on each side until golden brown.

When the halloumi is done frying, place on some paper towel to drain any excess oil.  In the meantime, give your burger buns a quick toast under the broiler if you want.

Then simply spread some of the lemon-herb mayo on the bun and assemble the burger.  We just had this with a nice fresh salad.  Will definitely be making this again!

strawberry spinach salad with raspberry-maple dressing

My friend in Stockholm introduced me to the restaurant chain Vapiano a long time ago and now whenever we see one on our travels, we always eat there. Soooo good!!! We just got back from Bahrain where they have a Vapiano and while I didn’t order this salad (too busy eating fresh pasta!!), it sounded really good so I thought I would try and make it when we got home.  I know the combo of strawberries, goat cheese and spinach is not a new concept but the dressing really made it!

This will serve 2 people as a side salad or 1 as a main.  And the recipe for the dressing will make just over a cup of dressing which is more than you need for this salad but it will keep in the fridge for at least a few days.

For the dressing: 1/3 cup apple cider vinegar / 2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil / a heaped 1/4 cup fresh raspberries / 2 tbsp maple syrup / salt and pepper to taste

For the salad: Roughly 125 grams of baby spinach / 2 tbsp pine nuts / a heaped 1 cup of fresh strawberries / about 75 grams of soft goat cheese / a few thin slices of red onion

First, make the dressing.  In a measuring cup, add all the ingredients and then using a hand blender, just give it a quick couple of pulses to puree the raspberries and blend everything together.

Next, in a pan over medium to medium high heat, lightly toast the pine nuts.  Just give the pan a few shakes every now and again to try and get all the sides toasty.

Now you just have to slice up the strawberries and assemble the salad. I just used a teaspoon to kind of scoop out the goat cheese. You can start with a bed of spinach and then layer everything else on top or just mix it all together. And finally drizzle over as much dressing as you would like.

And that’s it!  A very simple and bright, summery salad.