Super Pecan Caramel Rolls

We survived Thanksgiving and now the mad rush of holidays has begun. I love this time of year and everything that goes with it, especially the food. With more days off from work it means more days I get to make breakfast at home too. We do so many breakfast for dinner nights, it's not like we are lacking for breakfast items but it's just more fun eating it when it's actually for breakfast.

Danish Yeast Rolls

I think out of any type of bread other than your typical loaf of bread, I'm sure I've made cinnamon rolls the most. There's just nothing quite like a fresh from the oven cinnamon roll covered in sticky frosting. I've tried tons of different recipes and never really been disappointed with any. I certainly have my favorites and I love trying different variations of fillings and flavors.

I'm not quite sure what makes this specific recipe "Danish" but it's essentially a cinnamon roll but the filling is only sugar and coconut. I really like coconut and so I was surprised I had never tried this combination before. When I came across it at Red Star Yeast, I knew it was one I wanted to try.

Chocolate Cinnamon Crisps

I love experimenting with new recipes, especially bread ones. It's amazing how many different things you can make from a few simple ingredients.

Take this recipe from Red Star Yeast for example. All they've done is add some chocolate to the dough and then it's all in how you form the dough in the end. Yet it's completely different than anything I've made before. Almost like a flattened cinnamon roll but the chocolate brings it a whole new direction. The kids loved these, so it's a good thing I doubled the recipe to start with.

Pecan Caramel Sticky Rolls

Most of you know already that I make my own bread every week. The great thing about my bread recipe is that it's so versatile and I love making many different things with it. One of my favorites is to split some off and make cinnamon rolls, or the ultimate: Sticky Rolls.

Sticky rolls are created by creating a "smear" of butter, cinnamon and sugar that's placed on the bottom of the pan before the rolls go in. Then as they cook, the sugar is melted into a wonderful caramel sauce that cooks into the bottom of the rolls. After you bake them you flip the pan upside down so that the caramel ends up on top and runs down over the rolls. Sound amazing? Yeah, they are.

Orange Cinnamon French Toast

It's one of those breakfast for dinner kind of days. Minnesota just can't make up it's mind on this Spring thing and it's supposed to snow a few inches tonight. Breakfast for dinner is a pretty frequent occurrence around here so I did branch out a little bit and went with a new recipe just to throw in a little variety, for the kids of course. I grabbed my Tom Douglas' Seattle Kitchen because I thought I had seen some breakfast recipes in there and it's been a little neglected since I bought it a few months ago after seeing a demo of Tom in action.

Cinnamon Pecan Caramel Popcorn

I have to admit I'm not really a popcorn fan. At least not the buttered popcorn while you are watching a movie variety. However, if you take that popcorn, cover it in sugar and bake it, it's general appeal to me seems to increase dramatically.  This variety is my personal favorite. I've made four batches in the last week and eaten a large share of each one. The cinnamon in this recipe really makes it and I use a Vietnamese variety that has the perfect sweet-hot taste, providing just a little bit of bite to the finished popcorn. The pecans add a more refined taste but you could substitute them with any nut variety that you have on hand. Finally, I suppose you could use a microwave popcorn that was light in butter and salt but making your own popcorn on the stove is so easy and fresh popcorn really has no comparison.

Cinnamon-Spiced Hot Chocolate Cookies

The holidays roll around and that typically means that all kinds of cookie exchanges come along with it. I've never really been interested in participating in any kind of exchange primarily because I really only like cookies when they're fresh. Cookies just lose all their appeal to me once they cool down.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

There's just something about fall when it seems like everything should have some kind of pumpkin and spice in it. Of course there's your pumpkin pie and I also have been using pumpkin in a chocolate ship cookie recipe that I'll post later, however, it's also fun to find some new ways to add this great ingredient into new recipes. Pumpkin adds a great light flavor to breads and cakes and probably isn't as strong as you would think. It helps make a really moist dough and also gives the dough a nice light orange color.