Well I have never done this before. I have found lots of great blogs with lots of really great information out there and I thought well I have stuff I can share. Why not?
I love food! I love to cook, search for interesting recipes and ideas. Most of the time, when I find a great recipe I won't follow it. I will use it for inspiration though. That was how I learned to cook lasagne. I found several different recipes, compared notes and then did my own thing.
My most recent do my own thing was to make my version of what a lot of people will call a monkey bread. I wanted to mimic those cinnamon melts that McDonalds makes. My husband and son love them. They are pricey though. I wanted a lower fat version. I have seen similar versions but all of them use butter or margarine, but I wanted to reduce the fat because the biscuit dough has plenty already. So using a package of buttermilk biscuit dough, cinnamon, sugar and lemon juice, powdered sugar, vanilla and 3tbsp milk, I created 8 single servings for less than the cost of one serving at McDonalds.
Here's how:
Open and separate your biscuit dough. Cut each biscuit into 4 pieces. In a 1 qt or larger bowl, place 1/3 C of lemon juice and toss the biscuit dough pieces in the juice. In another 1 qt bowl mix 1/2 C sugar with 1tbsp of cinnamon and stir until well mixed.
Using a muffin tin for 12 spray 8 of the muffin wells well with pan spray or baker's secret. I prefer the baker's secret for baking. Set aside.
Toss 5 pieces of the biscuit dough in the cinnamon sugar until well coated and pile into one of the muffin wells. Repeat until you have all of your dough pieces in the muffin pan. You should have 5 pieces in each of 8 cups.
Bake following the directions on the package for the biscuits. While baking you can make the icing. Place 1 cup of powdered/icing sugar in a bowl and add 1/2 tsp vanilla and 3tbsp milk. Stir until smooth and you can set aside.
When your biscuits (cinnamon melts) are done remove from the oven. You will want to give them a few minutes. Place your icing in the microwave and heat for 30-45 seconds. This also depends on your microwave. You want it to be very warm, this will also loosen it and liquify the icing for pouring over your cinnamon melts. Using a tablespoon pour the warm icing over your cinnamon melts, re-warm your icing as needed.
Enjoy!
I don't remember how much my hubby spends on the cinnamon melts but I am guessing they are around $1.69 and the servings are quite large.
I paid $1.39 for store brand buttermilk biscuits. So for close to the cost of one serving I have at least 4 of equal size (serving 2 per person) or 8 smaller size portions. The best thing of all is they only take maybe 10 minutes to put together.
An alternative is to double the ingredients and put all of the biscuit dough into a loaf pan. You have to bake it longer but it works! Leftovers toast well!
Let me know what you think!
