Swedish cinnamon rolls (kanelbullar)

These cinnamon rolls are delicious with a cardamom bun dough and cinnamon-sugar-butter filling. They are found in almost all cafes in Sweden. Here are my tips on how you can succeed in making these fluffy, buttery buns in your home and impress your guests.

These are perfect for eating on a coffee break-the Swedish Fika. Read here more about the Fika tradition.

Jump to:

• What are Swedish cinnamon buns?
• Scandinavian cinnamon bun variations
• Swedish cinnamon buns vs. American
• History
• Ingredients
• Ingredients for the filling
• How to make vegan Swedish cinnamon rolls?
• Instructions
• Can you use topping?
• What else can you make from the bun dough?
• Questions
• Other Swedish sweet recipes
• Swedish cinnamon rolls

What are Swedish cinnamon buns?

The Swedish cinnamon bun is a sweet treat. It resembles white bread dough but has sugar and butter to make it sweet and moist. The buns also have a sugar-butter-cinnamon filling. You recognize Scandinavian buns from the cardamom in the dough.

In Sweden, the bun dough is often rolled with filling to make cinnamon rolls. This recipe shows how you make those. The dough can also be tied to a knot; then, they are called kanelknutar. You can also form the dough into yarn-like balls called kanelnystan.

Cinnamon buns are the most famous Swedish sweet treat to eat as a Fika. Buns are also a famous dessert competing with the top place along with the sticky chocolate cake.

Kanelbulle is one bun, and kanelbullar is many cinnamon buns in the Swedish language.

Scandinavian cinnamon bun variations

In Finland, you find the same cinnamon buns, but the roll is cut differently and gets a shape of an ear; they are called cinnamon ears, korvapuustit. These are also topped with pearl sugar.

Danes call their cinnamon buns for cinnamon snails, kanelsnegle. You might find these with icing and baked in an oven pan.

Norwegians call their cinnamon buns for kanelsnurrer, cinnamon swirls, and top them with regular white sugar.

Swedish cinnamon buns vs. American

The Swedish cinnamon buns/rolls are made in milk. They also don´t have icing as their American cousin has. The dough is always spiced with cardamom, and they are also topped with pearl sugar.

History

Wheat buns were made in 1800 in Sweden, but the buns with cinnamon butter filling became famous in the 1950s. After this, the popularity grew, and the cinnamon bun even got its day in 1999. It is celebrated every year on October 4th in Sweden.

If you want a more detailed history of the Swedish cinnamon buns, Isabelle has researched much of the past in her Swedish food blog.

Ingredients

• Flour. You can use all-purpose wheat flour.
• Milk. You can use water also. I like to use plant-based like Soy-, almond, or oat milk.
• Butter. If you want to make milk-free cinnamon buns, then use margarine instead. If this is not necessary, you should always use real butter since it tastes better.
• Sugar. Regular white sugar is commonly used in the recipe, but many like to use brown sugar. Brown sugar gives a different taste and deepness to flavor.
• Egg. The egg is optional. An egg is used to improve the dough's consistency; it makes it hold better in proofing(rising) and baking. The Egg does dry up the buns a bit; this can be noticed only after it has been stored for some days. If you want to, you can divide the egg, use half in the batter and half as an egg wash on top of the buns.
• Yeast. Swedes like to bake their bun dough with fresh yeast since they can find it in all supermarkets. Active dry yeast works equally well. In Scandinavia, the yeast is sold in 11 grams small bags. I measured this; it makes 1,5 tablespoons. In the US, the yeast packets are often 0,25 ounces, so only 7 grams. I would recommend using 1,5 packs for this recipe.
• Salt. It is essential for the consistency of the dough. It helps to give additional structure to the viscosity.
• Cardamom. You can find it as finely ground and more coarse ground. The medium-coarse ground is usually used in Sweden. You can use either for the recipe. You can find ground cardamom in the Amazon store. You get the best tasting and most aromatic cardamom flavor by grinding your own from pods.

There are two types of cardamom, black and green. You need to use green cardamom for all Scandinavian recipes.

To make your ground cardamom use a mortar and paste. Open the green pod, remove the seeds and mash them in the mortar to medium ground, not a fine powder.

You can also use a spice grinder for this. I like to use my Bamix immersion blender, which has a spice grinder add-on.

A bit more about the flour type

The Swedish flour has a bit more protein, so if you want to replicate authentic consistency, replace ⅓ of the flour with bread flour. One option is also to use ½ bread flour and ½ cake flour. You get nice buns even with just bread flour. So use what you have at home.

The dough needs to have gluten, so it is good that the flour has a good amount of protein. If you use only cake flour or pastry flour, the consistency will be softer and not get that good viscosity. Butter makes the dough a bit heavy; this is why it needs a good amount of gluten. If you only have cake flour, you can add a bit less butter to the dough; this makes it rise better.

Don't use self-rising flour for this recipe since this recipe has yeast as a leavening agent.

To make healthy buns, you can have whole wheat flour, but I think this gives a more "bready" taste. So if you want to eat authentic Swedish cinnamon buns, don't think about the calories and health factors.

To make gluten-free buns, you can use a gluten-free flour mix. You might need different flour and liquid ratios depending on the flour brand. I recommend adding some psyllium husk to get the same viscosity as gluten. 1 tablespoon of psyllium is suitable for this amount of dough.

Ingredients for the filling

• Butter
• Sugar. Use regular white or brown sugar.
• Cinnamon

What type of cinnamon to choose?

There are two most common types of cinnamon, Ceylon and cassia. The one you find on all shelves in Sweden is Cassia cinnamon.

Cassia cinnamon is perfect and flavorful for buns. Cassia does, though, contain coumarin. Coumarin is toxic if consumed in high amounts. Coumarin can affect the liver, but not in the small quantities that cinnamon buns have.

Children under one year should not consume cinnamon. One teaspoon for 50 kg(110pounds) is a safe daily limit. And it does not matter if it is exceeded for some days. You should not use cassia cinnamon for an extended time. So, beware of this during Christmas when most Scandinavian baking has cinnamon, and even the porridge is topped with it.

Ceylon cinnamon does not contain coumarin at high levels and is safe to use in higher amounts but a bit less flavorful.

How to make vegan Swedish cinnamon rolls?

Replace the regular milk with soy-, almond- or oat milk. Replace the butter with vegan butter or margarine. Skip the egg. Instead of egg washing the buns, you can brush them with some plant milk. To make a healthier version, you can replace the butter and sugar in the filling with date paste flavored with cinnamon.

The best-tasting vegan and milk-free butter for these Swedish buns is the Naturli vegan block. You can find this in Scandinavian food stores and the UK.

Instructions

1. Prepare your cardamom; take out the seeds if you have whole green pods. Ground your cardamom in a mortar if you don´t have ready ground cardamom.
2. Warm your milk to 108 F (42C); it should be slightly more than lukewarm but not feel hot to your fingers. It takes about 40 seconds in the microwave to warm up your milk. You can also warm your milk in a saucepan. Some melt the butter with the milk, but then you need more flour, and the dough becomes more dense and dry, so don't do it!
3. Put your dry yeast in a big bowl, add some warm milk and whisk it, so the dry yeast melts. Use the same procedure if you use fresh yeast; then you need to have a lower milk temperature, lukewarm.
4. Add the rest of the milk, sugar, cardamom, and ½ cup flour. Give it a whisk to make a slurry.
5. You can let your slurry rest for a couple of minutes, so the yeast activates from the warm milk and sugar. Add in the egg and salt and give it a whisk. The egg is best added at room temperature; this way, it does not cool down your dough. Adding a cold egg won't ruin your dough, but make sure to have time between adding it, so your yeast becomes active from the warmth. Salt and yeast are not buddies; this is why you add the yeast only now when the yeast has started to bubble.

6. Add in 2 cups of flour and stir with a big spoon. When the dough has some viscosity, you can add the room temperature soft butter. If your butter is not soft, you can microwave it for 10 seconds, but don´t warm it too much, so it gets hot and too liquidy.
7. After adding your butter, you can start kneading the dough with your hand; add the rest of the flour, ½ cup. Use a plastic glove on your hand if it feels messy, or make sure you have clean, washed hands when kneading.
8. Knead the dough for10 minutes with your hand. You know it´s ready when you take a small ball and stretch it; it does not break down immediately.
9. Let the dough rest for 15-30 minutes, not longer than that.

Shaping your rolls

1. My best tip for making these rolls with less mess is to spread some oil on your baking surface. The traditional way is to sprinkle some flour on the surface, but then the dough becomes denser.
2. Roll your dough ball with a rolling pin to a square or rectangle, 1-2 cm thick. (half an inch)The thickness affects the appearance of your ready rolls in the final result.
3. Make your filling; Mix the room temperature soft butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

4. Spread the filling evenly on your square.
5. Roll it, and then cut the roll to 13-15 pieces depending on how thick you want your buns to be. The roll made 15 pieces of buns. These in the picture are sliced quite thinly.

6. Put your buns on parchment paper, and make sure to leave space between the buns. The dough likes to rise in damp and warm conditions.
7. Let your buns rise for 30-60 minutes. Put a clean kitchen cloth or cling foil on top so they won't dry out. You can even spray some water on tense. If you have a cold home, you can place the sheet pan on a kitchen sink with some hot water; this way, the buns stay warm, the yeast keeps active, and the buns rise nicely.
8. Warm up your oven to 375F.
9. Give your buns an eggwash. Mix the beaten egg with some water and brush your buns thinly.

10. Sprinkle some pearl sugar or almonds on top. (pearl sugar can be bought on Amazon)
11. Bake your buns for 10-15 minutes, depending on how thick they are. They should get a golden brown color.

Can you use topping?

Sure, here are my tips for toppings

• Pearl sugar
• Regular sugar
• Sugar syrup
• Slivered almonds, put these on top before baking
• Crushed hazelnut, sprinkle on top before baking.
• Sugar icing
• Condensed milk
• Condensed coconut milk

What do you eat cinnamon rolls with?

• Eat these as a fika, a sweet treat with coffee.
• Perfect for taking along for a picnic
• A glass of milk is a favorite of kids
• As a sweet breakfast

What else can you make from the bun dough?

You can use this same bun recipe for:

• Semla, the Swedish and Finnish Lenten buns. The dough is formed into a round bun filled with whipped cream, jam, or marzipan.
• Finnish braided pulla.
• Vanillabuns
• Blueberry buns
• Marzipan buns
• Almond buns

Questions

Other Swedish sweet recipes

• Semla Round buns with marzipan and whipped cream
• Swedish thin pancakes-crepe like pancakes
• Chocolate balls; simple no-bake oat-coconut chocolate balls
• Swedish brownies- sticky chocolate treat with nuts.
• Swedish blueberry pie-oat crumble type of pie served with ice cream

Ok, if you are too lazy to make your cinnamon rolls, go and take a visit to IKEA. They sell such tasty Swedish cinnamon rolls. Buy some frozen ones, and bake them in your oven to get that Swedish experience with much less effort.