[Recipe] Cinnamon Rolls

Serves approximately 12-24 rolls

Dough:

1/2 Cup -- Water

1/2 Cup -- Whole Milk

2 1/4 tsp -- Active Dry Yeast (1/4 ounce package)

1/4 Cup -- Unsalted Butter

1 -- Egg Yolk

1 tsp. -- Vanilla Extract

2 Cup -- All Purpose Flour [This is an approximation because I used a lot of Flour, you'll probably need more so keep the bag out.]

1/4 Cup -- Sugar

1 tsp. -- Salt

1/2 tsp. -- Ground Nutmeg

Filling:

1/3 Cup -- Light Brown Sugar

1/3 Cup -- Granulated Sugar

2 Tbsp. -- Ground Cinnamon

1 -- Stick of Butter

Glaze:

2/3 Cup -- Confectioner's Sugar

1/3 Cup -- Sweetened Condensed Milk

1/2 -- Stick of Unsalted Butter [Melted]

1 tsp. -- Fresh Squeezed Lemon or Orange Juice.

1 tsp. -- Vanilla Extract

1/2 tsp. -- Ground Cinnamon

Directions:

1. Take the water and milk and combine them together, they should be at room temperature to begin with, so you can start with warm water. When you put your finger inside of the water and milk mixture, you shouldn't notice too much of a change in difference between the temperature of the liquid and the temperature of your finger.

2. Add the yeast into the mixture and sprinkle a bit of sugar [Not given in the recipe, just add a quarter of a teaspoon or so] on the top and leave it alone for a few minutes.

3. In a separate bowl, mix together the egg yolk, vanilla extract, the sugar, salt, and nutmeg together.

4. With the flour pour it onto a wooden or plastic cutting board, or a granite top table, and make a well [Make sort of a volcano shape with the flour leaving the middle with barely any flour.]

5. [You may want to get gloves as this gets a bit messy] Pour the mixture with the egg yolk in the middle and add the milk, water, and yeast mixture and slowly incorporate the flour into the wet ingredients. The dough should start forming and you can start kneading the dough. [If the dough is still very sticky, add more flour until it is barely sticky, then start kneading the dough.] When you are finished kneading the dough, make it into a round shape.

6. After kneading for a minute or two, prepare a bowl for the dough to proof in. Take some unsalted butter [room temperature] and start smearing it all over the inside of the bowl as well as on the outside of the dough itself.

7. Add the dough ball in the middle of the bowl and cover it with plastic wrap. With a marker, make a note of what time it is that you started proofing.

PROOFING NOTE: [Read this if you don't have your own proof box!] It is best that the proofing temperature is around 75-85 degrees Fahrenheit, with a bit of humidity. The best method I've found for doing this is to leave it in the garage on a table. If that isn't possible then the next best thing to do is leave it in an [clean] area around your house that's a little warmer than the rest.

8. It should be left in a warm place for about an hour where you'll see it grow in size. After it has proofed, punch it down and take it out of the bowl to knead it for a minute or so to develop the gluten even further. [If you need flour so it doesn't stick, you can use it to sprinkle on the board and on the dough itself.]

9. Put it back into it's ball shape and back in the bowl to refrigerate for 2-4 hours.

10. After it has been refrigerated it, sprinkle flour out on a board and roll it out to 10 by 8 square. [I say square, but when I rolled it out it was more of an oval; you can also slightly pull at the dough to make it more of a rectangular shape, but be careful not to rip the dough.] The dough shouldn't be very thick, it should be at most 1/2 an inch in thickness.

11. Mix together the filling ingredients in a bowl.

12. Smear the filling all over the dough starting from the inside and leaving an inch to 1/2 an inch of dough on the outside edge. [The filling should be very sticky since the butter is at room temperature.]

13. Roll the dough up and use a serrated knife to start cutting off the ends. This is a bit difficult, so you have to be very careful with how you cut the dough, you should be doing sawing motions repeatedly and not just cut straight down. The dough should be cut about an inch thick.

14. Line a baking dish with parchment or wax paper on the bottom and start lining up the cinnamon rolls as tightly as possible.

15. Proof again for about 30 minutes. [You can also refrigerate it for future use, up to a week at the most.]

16. Bake in an oven at 350*F for approximately 20 minutes.[The dough should have a golden brown color and when you poke the middle with your finger, the dough should be springy.]

17. Combine the Glaze Ingredients and drizzle over the warm Cinnamon Buns.

18. Serve and Enjoy. [It is best to serve as soon as possible, but it is possible to microwave the buns for almost the same effect.]

I've always had trouble with yeasty doughs, the main problem was proofing. If you can find a nice warm place for the dough to rise it will come out great. The dough itself isn't very sweet, the sweetness comes from the filling and the glaze, so depending on how sweet you'd like your buns to be, adjust accordingly!

If you have any questions, comments, or feedback, I would love to hear from you.

[Recipe] Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies

A friend of mine showed me a recipe like this and I made a few changes here and there to make it more to my liking. There are a lot of variations you can do with a cookie recipe like this, and I'll give some options, but you can get pretty creative with a cookie like this.

The texture is a lot like a fudge brownie, chewy in the center, but the outsides tend to be a little crispy. This is one of my favorite cookie recipes.

Serves roughly two to three dozen cookies [12-36 cookies] depending on the cookie scoop you use.

Also, on a storing note, make sure it is an air tight container for two to three days, so make sure you cut the recipe up to the amount you need! [I'll write about how to cut down a recipe at another time.]

Cookie Batter

8 Oz. -- Chocolate [Semi-Sweet, or Dark]

5 Tbsp. -- Unsalted Butter

2/3 Cup -- All Purpose Flour

½ tsp. -- Baking Powder

2 Each -- Whole Eggs

¾ Cup -- Light Brown Sugar

1 tsp -- Vanilla Extract

12 Oz -- Chocolate [Semi-Sweet, Dark, White, or really any chocolate you'd like]

¾ tsp. -- Sea Salt

OR

½ tsp. -- Table Salt

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350*F and prepare a baking sheet with either a spray, or if you have parchment paper, line it with that.

2. Coarsely chop the 12 Oz. of Chocolate and put it in a separate bowl. [It's easiest if you use a large serrated knife and just chop them until it is the size of small peas, some of the chocolate will become dust and it helps thicken the batter. If you use chips do the same thing]

3. Sift together the Flour, Baking Powder, and Salt in a separate bowl.

4. Combine the 8 Oz. of Chocolate with the butter and melt them together. [The easiest way to do this is to put them both in a microwaveable safe bowl and put them in for ten seconds at a time and stir them until all of the chocolate has dissolved and there aren't any lumps left]

5. With an electric mixer combine the eggs, brown sugar, and vanilla and blend it together. Blend for a couple of minutes until it is well incorporated and then add the melted chocolate [If it has gotten a little solid, microwave it for ten seconds]

6. Combine the dry ingredient mixture slowly. [The finished batter should look somewhat like a cake batter, slightly thick, but mostly runny.]

7. Combine the chopped chocolate in thirds and mix in with a plastic spatula each time.

8. Scoop them onto the prepared baking sheet, depending on the size of your scoop you should separate them by an inch or two.

9. Bake them in the oven for 11-12 minutes until the top begins to crack like a brownie.

10. When you take them off to put them on a cooling rack, it is optional to sprinkle on a few grains of sea salt. [This cuts the sweetness with a bit of saltiness and gives it an overall great flavor combination, if you don't have sea salt you can use table salt, but be very careful with it or you can turn a cookie into a salt disc.]

Options:

There are a lot of things you can do with this cookie, for this one I used white chocolate that came from the chip bag and chopped it coarsely. You could also use a peanut butter chip and chop that coarsely because chocolate and peanut butter is a great combination.

I made another batch and added coconut flakes and coconut extract instead of vanilla to make it a chocolate coconut cookie also using white chocolate chunks.

You can also go a vegan route and replace the eggs and butter with vegan butter and a ripe banana as a binder and make it a chocolate peanut butter banana cookie.

I'd also try to like to make this cookie a Rocky Road sort of flavor with marshmallows and nuts, when I start experimenting I'll put a successful one up!

I'd like to hear any feedback, comments, or questions you have for this recipe if you do decide to try it!