while in sweden, i sent postcards featuring cinnamon rolls to a few friends abroad, singing their praises and deliciousness… one of these friends decided that some baking was in order, so we’ve rolled up our sleeves and baked up the most delicious batch of kanelbullar that have ever left my oven. they’re soft and moist and just perfect. every bite is a guaranteed moan! :)

i found the recipe at chez larssons, and the only tweak we did was to double the amount of cardamom (because we’re all cardamom junkies around here).

you’ll need:

for the dough:
100 grams of butter
5 decilitres of milk
50 grams of yeast
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 decilitres of Sugar
2 tsp ground cardamom
5.4 cups of wheat flour

for the filling:
100 grams of butter
1 decilitre of sugar
2 tsp cinnamon

for the top:
1 egg
pearl sugar

procedure:
melt the butter, add the milk and heat until finger warm (not too hot!). crumble the yeast into a bowl. add a little bit of the milk/butter mixture and stir until the yeast is dissolved. add the rest of the milk/butter mixture, salt, sugar and ground cardamom and 2/3 of the flour.

mix and add flour until the dough comes off the sides of the bowl. save a little bit of flour for later.

cover the dough with a tea towel and let it rise until double the size, about 35-40 minutes.

mix the dough for a few minutes in the bowl and then knead it on the flour dusted work top with the rest of the flour, until it doesn’t stick too much.

then divide the dough into two equal parts. use a rolling pin to flatten the two dough parts into 20×40 cm each. mix the filling ingredients in a small bowl and spread the butter/sugar/cinnamon filling on the dough.

fold dough in half length-wise, then cut and twist according to the photos on this post so that you make pretty little knots.

put the knots on a covered or greased baking sheet. let rise under a tea towel for 20 minutes. whisk the egg in a bowl and use a pastry brush to brush the egg onto the knots. sprinkle some pearl sugar on top.

place in the middle of a 250C oven for 8-10 minutes until gloriously brown.

you’ll be licking your hands too…