Cinnamon Sugar Layer Bread with Vanilla Icing

Oh bread, why must you be so fickle? Luckily my third attempt using dry active yeast was a success. I didn’t want to give up on this recipe because it just looked so good. So after yesterday’s fluke, I went back to the store to buy more flour and vanilla extract and tried again! The cause for the failure was not “reactivating” the “dry active” yeast in warm water (110-115 degrees) rather than just adding it to the flour mixture like you would “instant” yeast.

The recipe is spelled out here. It’s an intensive process but a good learning experience. I watched a couple youtube videos on How to Knead Bread – very helpful.

Another fun cooking skill I learned was to brown butter. It smells amazing, giving the butter a nuttier flavor and brown color.
Roll the dough out really thin (with my new rolling pin – yay!)
The browned butter and cinnamon/nutmeg/sugar mixture is spread onto the prepared dough.

Then cut the dough into six strips. Stack. Slice that into six squares. Place in bread dish all in a row.

Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. Watch it puff.

Try to let it rest 15-20 minutes before ripping into it. I brought this over to a friend’s house for our Monday night dinners. It went just fine with the quesadillas and salsa salad.

My spin to the recipe was making a vanilla icing to drizzle on top of the cinnamon bread. Just like a delicious, flat cinnamon roll.

Vanilla Icing

1 cup confectioners sugar
1 1/2 – 2 tbsp milk
1 tbsp butter, softened
1/4 tsp vanilla extract (I threw in a little vanilla bean because I had it around)
dash of salt