Lion House Rolls and Monkey Bread

I love home made bread.  I've blogged about it before.

These rolls are famous in Utah and among the Mormon culture.  There is a reason for it - they are sooooo good!!!

There are videos on you tube on how to roll the dough, but I never got the hang of it.  It is a little intimidating.  This is how I do it. (I also changed the recipe a little bit because I never seem to have dry milk.  Sue me.)

Okay, I'm jumping the gun a little.  I was starting out to make Monkey Bread (a caramel pull-apart bread dessert - think extra gooey unformed cinnamon rolls, but not as cinnamon-y) and I realized that I would have some extra dough.  Thus, Lion House Rolls for dinner.  Score.

If you don't want to make the dough (you really, really do) use Rhodes frozen dough.  Allow 2 loaves of frozen dough to thaw, use one loaf for the bottom layer of the Monkey bread and one for the top layer.

*When I was little I used to say "cimmanon" instead of cinnamon.  When I spell-checked the blog, every cinnamon was spelled "cimmanon".  Guess I'm still childlike ;)*

Lion House Rolls

1 can evaporated milk plus enough warm water to make 2 cups

2 Tablespoons dry yeast

1/4 cup sugar

2 teaspoons salt

1/3 cup butter, softened

1 egg

5 to 5 1/2 cups flour, all-purpose or bread

In a large bowl of an electric mixer, combine water, milk and sugar.  Add yeast.  Let it sit for about 5 minutes until the yeast blooms.

Add butter, egg, 2 cups of flour and the salt.  Mix until the ingredients are wet (I use a dough hook for the whole process.)  While mixing, add the rest of the flour - you may not need it all.  Dough should be soft, not stiff.

Scrape dough off sides of bowl and pour about one Tablespoon of vegetable oil all around sides of bowl..Turn dough over in bowl so it is covered with oil. (This helps prevent dough from drying out.)

Cover with plastic and allow to rise in a warm place until double in size.

Sprinkle cutting board with flour and place dough on floured board.  Turn dough over so it is floured on both sides, and gently flatten to about 1 inch thick.  With a rolling pin or your hands, roll and shape into a rectangle about 18 inches long, 8 inches wide and 1/4 inch thick.  (I have never measured the dough - or used a rolling pin.)

With a pizza cutter or sharp knife, cut dough in half lengthwise.  Then cut dough in strips about every 2 inches.

Starting with short end, loosely roll one piece of dough.  Place roll on parchment-lined pan with the short end down.  Cover and let rise a bit.

Bake at 375 for 15-18 minutes, or until golden brown.  Brush tops of rolls with butter.

Monkey Bread

Prepare one recipe of Lion House roll dough, allow to rise once.  Divide dough into three equal parts, using 2 for the Monkey bread.  Make the rest into rolls.

2 parts Lion House roll dough

1/2 cup melted butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 large package (6 ounces) vanilla pudding mix (not instant)

3 Tablespoons milk

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Cinnamon-sugar

Coat 9x13 inch pan or large Bundt pan with non-stick vegetable spray.  Tear 1 part of dough into small pieces and drop randomly in bottom of pan.

Melt butter and add remaining ingredients, except cinnamon-sugar.  Stir until well blended.  Pour 2/3 of this mixture over the dough pieces in pan.  Tear second piece of dough into pan to fill in empty spots.  Pour remaining sauce over dough pieces, sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar.  Cover with plastic wrap and allow to rise in warm place until double in size.

Bake at 375 for 30 minutes.  Allow to cool 10 minutes, then invert onto large platter.