Today on The Stay At Home Chef
I'm showing you how to make Caramel Apple Cinnamon Rolls.
I've taken my fan favorite recipe for cinnamon rolls and added a caramel apple twist that'll knock your socks off.
This recipe starts with 1 cup of lukewarm milk.
You want it to be just warm to the touch like a baby's bath water.
To that we'll add 1 tablespoon of instant dry yeast,
and 2 tablespoons of sugar.
If you want to use active dry yeast, you'll use the same amount,
but you'll let this mixture sit for 10 minutes,
but with instant yeast we can move right along.
Next I'll add in 1 teaspoon of salt,
and 3 tablespoons of softened butter.
Add in one large egg,
and then we'll start adding in 3 cups of all purpose or bread flour.
The exact amount of flour that you need always varies a little bit,
so start low, and you can always add more as necessary.
Continue mixing until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
If it sticks to the side,
that means you need to add more flour.
You're looking for a dough that's super soft like play-doh,
and is tacky but not sticky enough that it sticks to your hands.
Then we'll transfer it to a lightly greased mixing bowl and cover it with a towel
and let it rise until double in size, which will take about 1 hour.
Now if we take a peek here I actually already have one that's risen,
so you can see the difference in size.
Go ahead and turn the dough out onto a clean countertop,
and we're gonna roll this out into a large 12 inch x 18 inch rectangle.
Then one of the benefits of printing recipes is that I have an 8.5 x 11 inch ruler,
so I know that that's you know about 18 inches by 12 inches,
and of course it doesn't have to be perfect.
What you're looking for is basically just an even layer of dough.
Then we're going to take 1/2 cup of room temperature butter
and start spreading it out into an even layer on top of our dough.
Leave about 1/4 - 1/2 inch around the edges just so you can seal this up.
Then take 1/2 cup of brown sugar,
and you're gonna stir in 1-2 tablespoons of ground cinnamon,
and sprinkle this in an even layer right on top of the butter.
So far it's like a regular cinnamon roll,
but now the fun begins.
You'll need 2 apples.
I'm using Granny Smith because I like the tartness,
but you could really use any apple you'd like.
You want to dice the apples into small pieces.
The small pieces will bake a lot quicker so that they'll be nice and soft when you bite into your cinnamon rolls.
Then we'll sprinkle those on top of the brown sugar cinnamon layer.
Now how many apples you need depends on the size of your apples.
It takes about 2 small ones or 1 large.
Then the really fun part,
we're gonna drizzle on about 1/2 cup of caramel sauce.
You can see I'm just using the caramel sauce that you buy in the ice cream section,
and I'm estimating it to be about 1/2 cup,
there's no need to be perfect on those amounts
because we're going to add more caramel sauce on top after these have baked.
Then it's time to roll this up as tightly as we can.
So I like to be gentle as I get it started,
and just kind of fold the dough over the tops of the apples,
and then you should be able to start getting it to roll.
Slowly keep rolling.
It kind of pushes the toppings forward,
so I like to leave a good gap at the end here so that i'm able to seal it up.
Then when we get to the end I actually take that bottom piece and stretch it up
and press it into the little log that we've created.
That kind of helps seal up the edges and keep everything inside.
We need to cut this log into 12 rolls,
so I'm going to take my serrated knife and start marking out where I'm going to cut,
then we can gently slice into these using a sawing motion
so that you don't have to apply too much pressure and squish your rolls.
Then you'll place each slice into a lightly greased 9 x 13 pan.
Once you have all 12 rolls in your pan you're gonna cover this and let these rise again for 30 - 45 minutes.
In the meantime you'll want to preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Once your rolls have risen we're gonna bake these in the 350 degree oven for about 18 - 20 minutes or so
until the tops are golden brown.
I like it when they're just kissed with golden brown on top.
Once they're done remove them from the oven.
Then we'll let these cool off for about 15 minutes.
Now you have a couple of options.
You could make a traditional little cream cheese glaze to go on top like cinnamon rolls,
or you can just add on caramel.
I like to go with the caramel so it really accentuates all of those apple flavors in there
and doesn't hide them with the cream cheese glaze.
Then another option,
you know how caramel apples are sometimes dipped in nuts?
Well you could also sprinkle on some chopped pecans or chopped walnuts.
You can let them cool off and store them covered for about 3-5 days,
or you can eat them while they're warm.
Thanks for watching.
You can find the full written recipe in the video description.
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