Skip to main content
Dessert

Cinnamon Loaf

A sweet loaf made by rolling cinnamon-sugar buttered dough, letting it rise, then baking until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cinnamon Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Shape

  1. Roll out the bread dough to about ½ inch thick.

  2. Spread the dough thickly with butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

  3. Starting at one end, roll the dough up tightly.

  4. Let the rolled dough rise until doubled in size.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden brown.

  2. Slice off the end before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  4. Bread + cinnamontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,705 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Bread dough
Forms the structure and, as it rises, the soft airy crumb of the loaf.
Butter
Adds fat that keeps the crumb tender and helps the surface brown.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and caramelizes during baking for added browning.
Ground cinnamon
Provides the warm aroma and flavor that defines the loaf.

The step that matters

Rolling the dough up tightly. A loose roll leaves air gaps and uneven layers, so the filling can spill out or bake unevenly. Tight, even rolling keeps the spiral intact through rising and baking.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Bread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesSoft Ginger BreadSoft Ginger Bread85 recipesOrange Potato BreadOrange Potato Bread80 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipes