As my grandmother says, school is only the beginning of education. We continue to learn all throughout our lives, and we must make sure we stay in practice on the basics. For example, you read every day, don’t you? Likewise, it is important to keep up on our foreign language skills and our math skills as well. Today’s post will help you do just that.
Remember those blueberry muffins we made earlier this week? You know, the ones with the streusel topping? If you recall, I ended up with way more streusel than I needed. But when you have gone to the trouble of making streusel, you no sooner would throw it out than you would your fourth grade yearbook.
So I did what any resourceful lady would do and thinked up a way to use the streusel: cinnamon rolls.
I would do it the real classy way, I decided, with store-bought crescent rolls in the canister that POPS! open and scares the bejeezus out of you. And then I would use some leftover orange juice that I had bought for making my pork roast and throw together some kind of an orange icing to drizzle over top.
Now, I never could get my head around why the French call you-know-what “la petite mort,” or, “the little death.” (This is the part where we brush up on our foreign language skills.)
Until, that is, I responsibly decided to sample a streusel cinnamon roll with orange icing. You know, just to make sure this experiment of mine hadn’t yielded something poisonous. And then in about three bites that happened so quickly it was almost like I’d momentarily blacked out, the entire thing was gone. As I sat stunned in the aftermath, I said to myself, “I think I just died a little bit.”
And suddenly it clicked, the way driving a stick shift or riding a bike clicks. La petite mort. They ought to call it, “What I just experienced was so fantastic that I am now hovering in a euphoric state of transcendence.” But I guess that’s not as catchy — or as irksomely French — as la petite mort.
Now here is where the math part comes in. You might notice that I made 8 of these things (that’s how many come in Pillsbury’s precious package). But there are only 6 on the plate in this last picture. See what happened was, I ate the first one, and then Baby Girl was like, “Hey, what about me?” So I had to eat another one… for her. 8 – 2 = 6.
So there were 6 when Mike got home from work last night. “You have to try these,” I insisted (even though he complains when I bake because it’s fattening, and even though these contain orange juice and Mike was recently diagnosed as being “mildly allergic” to citrus). Mike is a good husband who never wants to disappoint his wife, so he ate one. You know, to make me happy. And he agreed that they were pretty amazing. At some point, I finally went upstairs to bed while he stayed on the couch watching TV.
All I know is, there were only 2 left this morning. There had been 6, and now there were 2. So somehow in the time when he arrived home from work last night, and the time he left for work this morning, he managed to make 4 streusel cinnamon rolls with orange icing magically disappear. If you are what you eat, I know a guy who is very sweet today.
Baby Girl and I want to be sweet too, and we needed breakfast this morning. Let’s just say that 2 – 2 = 0. YES. WE ATE THEM ALL.
For education’s sake, I think you should refresh your French skills and math skills, and make these for breakfast this weekend.
STREUSEL CINNAMON ROLLS WITH ORANGE ICING
1 canister store-bought crescent rolls
2 T butter, melted
streusel topping — recipe here (although you could also throw together some ground cinnamon, brown sugar, and crushed nuts)
For the icing:
2 T unsalted butter
1 C confectioner’s sugar, measured then sifted
2 T orange juice
1/2 t vanilla extract
Preheat oven according to package directions on crescent rolls. Roll out dough, separating into the 8 perforated pieces. Brush each with melted butter. Spoon streusel topping (or cinnamon-sugar mixture) onto each piece. Roll up each pastry as directed on the package, place on a baking sheet, and bake according to package directions. (I did 350 for about 15 minutes.)
Meanwhile, measure out all ingredients for the orange icing. On a double boiler on the stove (I use a metal mixing bowl and a saucepan), melt butter. Remove from heat and whisk in sugar and orange juice. Return to the double boiler over a low simmer and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat, add vanilla extract, and continue to stir. The icing will thicken as it cools. Miss Impatient over here put my metal mixing bowl into a larger bowl of ice water to make this happen a little faster.
Allow rolls to cool for about 5 minutes after they come out of the oven, then transfer to a cooling rack. When the icing has reached your desired viscosity, spoon over the warm rolls. Serve immediately (recommended) or allow to cool completely on the rack and store in tupperware (also really good).
Oh la la,
P.S. Thanks for all your design suggestions! I’ll keep you posted as to what we end up doing… we’re hoping to get it done sooner rather than later, as we have somebody else‘s room (ahem) to move onto next! xoxo