Twisted Cinnamon Bread

Yeast bread in the oven is one of my favorite smells.  Add in some cinnamon, and it can’t be topped.

I wanted to bake a pretty sweetbread, one where the filling showed.  I wanted the filling to permeate the dough so that it didn’t need dressing up with glaze or streusel.

I wanted a bread that tasted and smelled like dessert, all by itself.

No matter that I wanted to eat it for breakfast…

So I got out my Bread Bible cookbook by Beth Hensperger.  If you like to bake bread, of any type, I highly recommend this cookbook.  A goldmine of bread-baking knowledge.

I mixed up her recipe for Sweet Yeast Dough.  The recipe is quick to mix up and takes very little actual kitchen time.  But you have to plan ahead for rising.  It gets a nice long rise (12-24 hours) in the refrigerator.

After the long rise, I rolled it out into two rectangles and prepped it like cinnamon rolls.  Mmm… cinnamon rolls… I should make some of those too…

I brushed the dough with melted butter, then sprinkled liberally with cinnamon and brown sugar.  I rolled each up, starting with the short side, and pinched the seam to hold it together.

My goal was a short twist of some sort showing multiple layers of the cinnamon and brown sugar.  I had seen all sorts of versions that cut down a cinnamon roll log length-wise to expose the filling, so I tried it.

It’s a little messy, but totally worth it.

Then I gently twisted the halves over each other a couple times and tucked in the end.

My husband was chuckling at me when I finished this loaf.  My smile was about to split my face open, I was so proud of it.

As these baked, they filled our house with the most wonderful aroma.  It lingered for hours.

Admittedly, the bottoms were slightly burned, but they were perfectly baked in the center, soft and delicious.  Sweet, cinnamon dessert bread…

Sometimes I worry about bread getting stale before we can finish it, especially recipes that bake two loaves.  But not this time.

My kids and I, we polished off a loaf at breakfast.

And we scarfed down the other at lunch.

It was just that good.

Are you baking this weekend?  I’d love to hear what you have planned!

~Katie