Kanelbullar…
Also known as cinnamon rolls to all you non Swedish speaking people. If I had been more on top of things I would have made these on Kanelbullar Dag (Cinnamon Roll Day) October, 4. Oh well, January 30 will just have to do.
I got this recipe from a Swedish cookbook that my sister bought for me in Sweden a few summers ago. Thank the Lord that they were selling it in both Swedish and English. I do not read or speak much Swedish, so I would have been in a heap of trouble trying to bake in Swedish.
Despite the book being in English, I still managed to run into a little snag due to the cultural differences. For example, many of the measurements are in grams. No problem! I will use my trusty food scale.
Another snag. Who uses deciliters? The Swedes, that’s who! So, I had to test my math skills (and use an online converter) to convert to cups then to grams.
The dough came together nicely, and smelled wonderful thanks to the cardamom.
After flouring my counter I split the dough in half and rolled it out. It rolled easily and didn’t give me much trouble as far as sticking goes.
The filling was pretty crumbly, so I will probably melt the butter, or at least soften it more next time. That way it will make more of a paste and less of a crumb mixture.
When I ate these in Sweden they were so adorable. Instead of the typical American cinnamon roll which is slathered in icing, these rolls are simply twisted and knotted, then sprinkled with sugar. I had a little bit of trouble with the twisting and knotting method. The filling kept falling out onto the counter, again, I think my filling should have been less crumbly. So, my knotted rolls weren’t as cute or as neat as the Swedish rolls.
I made half of the rolls using the twist and knot method.
The other half of my dough was rolled out, spread with the remaining filling, then all rolled up…more like an American roll I guess. 
Then I cut the log into 1 1/2 inch slices and placed them in an 8×8 inch greased pan. I left a little room in between them so that they had room to spread and rise during baking. I was able to fit 9 rolls in the 8×8, so I used the remaining dough to see how they fared in a muffin tin. The baking time varied a bit in the 8×8…maybe 5 minutes longer or so, but the muffin tin took about the same as the twisted rolls.
The verdict.
If you would rather do without the supersweet icing, then these rolls are for you! The focus is on the bread, which is soft on the inside with a nice crisp crust. The filling is delicious and adds just the right amount of extra sweetness to the rolls. The only complaint is that the filling that escaped made a rather sticky mess on the bottom of each roll. This is not a problem for me since I like the flavor and crunch of caramelized sugar. Be careful of the baking time, or this caramelized goodness will become burnt nastiness! This mistake was made on just one batch of rolls, but the rest were great.
Here is a great shot of one roll rising above the rest. I will type up the recipe soon!
