in search of the perfect cinnamon roll

the saint cinnamon near where i work (that i happen to walk past every morning) sells these little cinnamon sticks. they normally sell them in a package of 6 but i convinced the woman one day to sell me just 2 of them (come on, do i look like i really need 6?!?!). she reluctantly agreed but insisted that i would eat those 2 and just want to come back for more. i thought: no kidding, what was your first clue? so since then i've been on a mission to bake for myself a cinnamon pastry or bread that will satisfy my craving, when required, in an effort to avoid buying 6 of these evil little sticks every day.

the first attempt was mediocre at best. the dough didn't rise and when they cooled, the rolls were more chewy than gooey. i was so disappointed i didn't even take them to work but they seemed to get consumed without any complaints at home anyway. the second attempt (at the same recipe - i wanted to see if it was just a problem with the yeast) was possibly even worse than the first. this time robin complained that they were rolled too tightly and too thin. fine.

last week i decided to move from the tried and true 'how to cook everything', our cooking bible, to epicurious.com. i found one recipe for swedish cardamom rolls and one for cinnamon pinwheels. this past weekend i made the swedish cardamom rolls, forgot the eggs, and am once again disappointed in the result. i think the recipe calls for too much cardamom and not enough sugar and cinnamon and the dough was understandably lacking (my fault of course). i have made the pastry dough for the pinwheels and hope to make them up tonight.

people at work have been going without for a while now because it's taking me so long to come up with a recipe i like (and successfully execute it!). perhaps no one would complain about yet another batch of lemon squares at this rate :P