Chocolate and Hazelnut Rolls
Last year, we may have gotten a bit excited with making rolls – the classic cinnamon rolls and delicious cheesy garlic rolls – but we can’t help it! Once you get the hang on the recipe and technique, you’ll be making rolls upon rolls upon rolls.
The beauty of making rolls is that you can switch the flavours up as you please – we’ve seen red velvet, oreo, turkey bacon and cheese, peanut butter and jam, basically everything and anything! Today, we’ve decided to go down the chocolate, cinnamon and hazelnut route as you can never go wrong with a little bit of chocolate!
Chocolate and Hazelnut Rolls Recipe
INGREDIENTS
500g plain flour
7g instant yeast*
100g caster sugar
2 eggs
Pinch of salt
75g unsalted butter, melted**
250ml warm milk
For the filling:
113g unsalted butter, softened
130g brown sugar
2 tbsp cinnamon powder, optional
2-3 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
Crushed hazelnuts
Dark chocolate chunks, optional
Cream Cheese Icing:
225g cream cheese, softened
1 tsp vanilla paste
57g unsalted butter, softened
225g icing powder
NOTES
* If using active dry yeast, add the warm milk first to the bowl with the sugar and yeast. Whisk and leave to the side so that it can froth up – this should take 5 minutes – and then add the remaining dough ingredients.
** Be sure to melt the butter first before gathering together all of your ingredients as it has time to cool down before you add it into the flour mixture.
METHOD
- In a bowl, whisk together the flour, instant yeast and sugar. Then mix in the salt, melted butter and eggs, and slowly add in the warm milk until the dough comes together – you may not need all of the milk. Knead the dough using either your hands or a stand mixer until the dough becomes smooth and elastic. Form the dough into a ball, place in a well-oiled bowl, cover in cling film and leave to rise in a warm place until it doubles in size.
- In a small bowl, mix together the unsalted butter, brown sugar, cinnamon powder and cocoa powder until it becomes a smooth paste.
- Once the dough has risen, roll it out into a rectangle that is a 1/2 inch thick and spread the chocolate cinnamon mixture in the middle making sure to leave a good border around the edge. This is so that the mixture does not seep out during cooking. Sprinkle the hazelnuts and dark chocolate chunks, if using, on top.
- Starting from one long end, slowly start to roll the dough up tightly until you reach the end and pinch the edges together to seal it up. Taking dental floss or an extremely sharp knife, cut equal sized rolls (you should get around 12-16 rolls from this) and place the rolls in a deep baking tray that is lined with greaseproof paper, making sure to leave a little gap between each roll. Cover in cling film and leave to rise for 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 180c/160C fan-assisted/Gas Mark 4. Remove the cling film from the tray – the rolls should have expanded in size – and place the tray in the oven to cook for about 20 minutes. If you notice the tops are browning a lot, cover the tray loosely with foil and continue cooking until the rolls are golden brown.
- Whilst the rolls are cooling down, assemble the cream cheese frosting. In a bowl, whisk together the butter and cream cheese until they are fully mixed. Add in the vanilla paste and salt and mix together. Finally, add in the icing sugar a little bit at a time to ensure there are no lumps. Leave this to the side and do not refrigerate.
- Once the rolls have cooled down, spread the cream cheese frosting all over them and they are ready to eat!
