Overnight Cinnamon Rolls + Big Batch Cinnamon Rolls

Extended Life for: Whole Milk (Whey), and Grapes (Raisins)

While at the Allen's for our first Christmas of 2010 (celebrating the New Year in Deadwood, followed by a warm Christmas by the fireplace with my dear family, after the new year began) I of course felt the need to send my parents to the grocery store so that I could prepare them mass amounts of Cinnamon Rolls. Many may be surprised to learn that my very own mother was a great baker of cinnamon rolls while I was in my youth. Often for Christmas we would enjoy warm, sticky cinnamon rolls during our easy days at home. Being the lover of food that I am and a sucker for memories, I was fully inspired to bring back the tradition of cinnamon rolls for Christmas.

I experimented with a couple recipes, the first one can be found at Allrecipes.com. The only adjustment I made was to use whey (from Mike's cheese-making) rather than milk. The other recipe is from a Mennonite Cook-book I received from my dear sister-in-law. The recipe made an uncanny amount of cinnamon rolls. As any sane person would do, I simply rolled out multiple batches, added the cinnamon sugar, rolled and froze for another day. Here then is the Giant Batch Cinnamon Roll recipe...(P.S. The greatest attraction of this recipe is it is a no knead dough, but a huge batch!)

Ingredients/Directions:

1 cup warm Water

4 pks. dry Yeast

1 tsp. Sugar

Mix these three ingredients in a very large bowl until dissolved. Set aside.

3 1/2 cups hot Water or Whey

1 cup Margarine

1 cup Sugar

4 tsp. Salt

Combine and stir until melted. Cool to lukewarm and add to yeast mixture.

10-12 cups All-Purpose Flour

Beat in flour until the dough is thick but still sticky, not stiff enough for kneading. Place in another large greased bowl, grease top of dough and let rise until double in size. Sprinkle flour on counter and roll dough into a rectangle about 1/2 inch thick (May do this in multiple small batches or go for the whole thing at once).

2 1/2 cups Brown Sugar

1 1/2 tsp. Cinnamon

3/4 cups Nuts, Raisins or Chocolate Chips (optional)

Mix and sprinkle over dough. Roll dough up like a jelly roll and cut into about 1-inch slices...NOW: either don't cut through to the bottom and just wrap 6-8 rolls in wax paper and saran wrap to freeze OR place in greased pans, let rise until double again. Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned. If you are preparing from frozen, remove from freezer night before, finish the cut and place in greased pans in the fridge until morning then prepare as directed.