Cinnamon Swirl Bread
ShareAn easy and flavorful recipe for fluffy homemade cinnamon swirl bread, perfect for breakfast or snacking.
This bread has been on my recipe list for a while. You know, that bucket list of foods to make. I don’t have an actual list per say, but maybe one of these days I’ll make a physical list and cross things off as I go. I’m a big list maker so I’m not sure why I haven’t done that yet.
I’m not sure about you, but this bread really screams ‘dad’ to me. It’s just that kind of bread. The bread that you, or rather I, grew up seeing my dad enjoy. Only that variety had raisins and I don’t like raisins so I didn’t dare add them in. But I came *this* close to adding apples and then the Mr gave me the stink eye. Or something like that.
Next time I’ll have my way and it’ll be even more incredible, just on a whole other level. Apples + cinnamon = awesome. And we already know that apples + cinnamon + bread = crazy awesome so yes… next time.
I honestly feared that this would be difficult to make or would be a complete disaster somehow. And while it is a stickier dough than I’m typically use to, it gave incredible results. Do not fear the yeast people. Embrace it in the new year and make this incredible soft and flavorful bread with dark swirls of cinnamon. Eat it as is or toasted with a slathering of butter or even have it be the star of your next batch of French toast, your call.
Cinnamon Swirl Bread
Ingredients
- 1 C milk plus 2 Tbsp divided
- 6 Tbsp unsalted butter
- 2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast
- 3 large eggs divided
- 1/3 C granulated sugar
- 3 1/2-4 C all purpose flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 Tbsp unsalted butter softened
- 1/3 C granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 Tbsp cinnamon
Instructions
- In a 2-cup measuring cup, heat milk and butter to 115-120°F. Sprinkle with yeast, allow to sit for several minutes.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, with paddle attachment, mix together 1/3 cup granulated sugar and 2 eggs. With mixer on low, pour in milk mixture. Switch to the dough hook, add salt and flour. Add additional flour as needed. It should pull away from the sides of the bowl but remain sticky.
- Grease your hands and a large bowl well with baking spray or olive oil. Transfer dough to bowl, cover and allow to rise for 1 1/2-2 hours or nearly doubled in size.
- On a lightly floured surface or a silicone counter mat, roll dough to the wide length of your pan (ex: 10 inches) and aproximately 18-22 inches long. Rub with softened butter and sprinkle entire surface with cinnamon and sugar.
- Roll as tightly as possible and pinch seams closed. Place dough seam side down in a loaf pan greased with butter or baking spray. Cover and allow to rise for additional 1 1/2-2 hours.
- Preheat oven to 350°F. In a small bowl, beat together 1 egg and 2 Tbsp milk. Brush exposed dough with egg wash. Bake for 35-40 minutes. Allow to cool slightly in pan before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
So beautiful, Rachel!
Hey twin ;) I love that we both posted bread. Yours is sweet, mine’s kinda savory? Either case, this is why we need to be neighbors so we can switch with each other whatever we baked/cooked. I love cinnamon swirl bread – my mom used to buy it all the time when we were younger and slather butter on it for us for breakfast. Yup, healthy kids ;)
What a gorgeous bread!
You can’t go wrong with cinnamon swirl bread! I bet it makes great toast for breakfast. And I agree with you – no to raisins, yes to apples :)
oooooooooooooohhh YUM!!!
I looooove cinnamon bread (even if it has raisins, which is weird because I don’t love raisins). Toasted, slathered with butter, mmm. Totally reminds me of my childhood. I’ll have to try this!
I love cinnamon swirl bread! Delish!
Wow, this looks amazing! Years ago I had a recipe for cinnamon swirl bread that I loved. In between moves or something I lost it and from time to time that recipe was on my mind. So happy to see this so I can make a loaf of this incredible bread again.
Love cinnamon anything at this house – looks perfect!! It is on my bucket list too :)
Love this one! I have tons of recipes for cinnamon, cinnamon raisin, raisin, cinnamon swirl breads and english muffin breads but have always wanted to still try this PW recipe and now I need to. Yours is just so fluffy & perfect – I love it!
The only thing missing is a giant cup of coffee. Other than that this is the perfect breakfast!
Gorgeous bread! Love the idea of adding apples, too – would love to know how that turns out! Hope you’re having a lovely start to the New Year! :-)
I may have to try it with apples sometime very soon! :)
Your bread looks fantastic! Soft and sweet! Got to try it soon! Happy New Year!
Your bread looks delicious!
Looks yummy and will have to make this weekend.
I hope you do! Let me know how it turns out. :)
My coworker always toasts his cinnamon swirl bread as his morning snack and the smell is just absolutely divine – I have to make this myself sometime. I don’t know what has taken me so long – but now I must.
Yuuuuum! You can’t beat cinnamon bread! Now I want to make some!
G’day! I have ALWAYS wanted to make swirl bread as it reminds me of VERY special people who adopted my like a grandchildren!
I would LOVE to make this bread and love the idea of Cinnamon Apple with a bit of a twist too! Thank you! WHOO HOO!
I wish that you lived right next door so that I could come over and help you eat this!
looks lovely :)
i love cinnamon swirl bread!!
grew up an Arnold Bakery bakery. at middle school if the breeze was in the right direction we would get the best cinnamon raisin bread smell.
looks awesome
My 5yo came up to me as I was reading this post and said mom, we need to make that, like now. So we are off to bake a loaf of cinnamon bread for breakfast tomorrow, as he wants his toasted with butter. In more ways than you could ever know, I needed this today.
This bread is seriously gorgeous!! I cant wait to make it! And I would bet the apples would have been a perfect addition too. Mmm, now Im craving this as well as your chili!
Love that pretty swirl and well cinnamon is always a good thing in my book!
This Cinnamon Swirl Bread is beautiful and looks simple to make. This would totally beat anything bought at the store. Yum!
I started this bread this evening and as I’m doing so I’m realizing it would be so nice if you had progression pictures of this recipe. It’s my first time making it and bread is intimidating to me in general, so having pictures to reference would be very helpful! I’m on my second rise before baking, hopefully all turns out well!
I hope it turns out for you and that you enjoy it!
This bread looks so good and I agree with Rachel that bread is a bit intimidating to make. It’s not as simple as making your own pie crust or pasta from scratch. I just tried making this and my dough didn’t rise during the first or second time. I’m so bummed and don’t know why. My yeast is still good as is everything else…. So jealous… :-S
Bread making isn’t always cut and dry. There are a lot of factors that come in to play. If your bread didn’t rise at all – the liquid could have been too hot and killed the yeast, not hot enough and didn’t activate the yeast or the yeast could have been bad.
Lol, oops… I meant to say “Rachel, I agree with Marci”
Hmmm…. I’m thinking maybe it was the way I heated up the milk? Because I followed your instructions to the T (always like to perfect the original before I start to deviate). How did you hear up the milk? What I did was pour the milk and butter into a small saucepan, heated it up by setting the stove on simmer and put the lid on for a few min (and stirred every so often to make sure all the butter melted along with the milk not sticking to the bottom). Then I checked the temp of my milk (it was perfectly 115), so I turned off the stove, added the yeast and put the lid back on. Then I let it sit for about five minutes amd stirred it every so often before I continued with the rest of steps. I’m thinking that the problem was either because even though the stove was off that I left the saucepan on the stove or perhaps because I didn’t transfer it to a different container before pouring the yeast all together or because I shouldn’t have storied after putting the yeast? The weird thing is that I know the yeast was good because it’s a brand new bottle and it was the first thing I checked before even starting at all, so the yeast did bubble like it should have after pouring it in.
I microwave in a glass measuring cup to the desired temperature, dissolve and let rest. Heating in a saucepan, leaving in the saucepan and covering will likely heat it up more than it should be – even more so if left on the stovetop.
Hmmm… That makes sense. I’ll have to try it again. Thanks for the tip! :-)
Do you stir after you pour the yeast? Or just let it sit for a few minutes and then mix it in the egg/sugar mixture?
The gentlest of stirs just enough to have all of the yeast covered by whichever liquid I am mixing with that day. If the liquid is at the right temperature, that’s all it needs. Don’t disturb the mixture after that initial point.
It was a-ma-zing! I ate it plain, with butter and made french toast out of it, fried in bacon fat obvs, and it was like a religious experience. Also, I never had any bread of mine rise that well. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the awesome recipe! :)
So glad to hear it! And the bacon fat method sounds delicious!
this just came out of the oven and it is perfect, can’t wait to have a slice.
I have to agree with you that raisins should not be in my cinnamon bread (although I do like golden raisins). I can’t wait to make this. I have plenty of multigrain bread laying around, but sometimes you just want something sweet.
Enjoy! :)
quick question…. Hopefully it’s not too late in the thread. But can one use bread flour?
It may cause the bread to be a bit more dense than it is using all purpose, but you’re more than welcome to try!
This bread looks fabulous! I used to love cinnamon bread as a kid, and this looks delicious. Thanks for sharing this recipe!
Thanks Jodee!