In Haught Pursuit: Celebrating St. Lucy Grain-free

The top roll has glaze. I decided to wait on icing the others until I could do some taste-testing with Emma.

Emma and I just finished eating almond flour cinnamon rolls that I baked for St. Lucy's feast. I definitely need more practice at this recipe from The Urban Poser, but it shows good promise. Or maybe I show promise as a baker of almond flour goods. That's probably more accurate, as the problems were caused by operator error. :)

The main problem was that I should have rolled the dough out into a thinner rectangle. If I had done that, I think I could have rolled it up into a tighter log for slicing, which would have prevented the second problem of the individual rolls falling apart. On second thought, this may have been caused by my inability to follow the "less is more" philosophy. I could not stop myself from loading the dough with raisins and nuts. I totally disregarded the amounts called for and just plastered the dough until I basically could not see it anymore. Last of all, they probably should have baked longer, but with almond flour's tendency to burn, I opted for doughy. Also, Emma was in a hurry to leave to go spend the day with a friend from church who has three little girls and is now expecting twins.

Despite all the issues, they tasted pretty good, and we had managed to fittingly celebrate the Liturgical year with a grain-free feast.

Well, I just went back and nibbled on one of the rolls. I think they taste even better now that they are cold. The texture has improved too. They are not doughy after all--quite nice, actually.

While I was baking the cinnamon rolls, I re-heated Mexican hot chocolate on the stove that Emma made yesterday for the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. She followed a paleo recipe that used coconut milk. When the rolls were ready, Emma poured us each a cup of the thick chocolate and scooped a dollop of whipped cream on top of each. She took a sip and complained that it burned her throat. I've noticed that both of my children are more sensitive to heat than I am, so I didn't think anything of it. Then I took my first sip and squealed. That chocolate burned the roof of my mouth and all the way down my throat! I don't know if it held the heat more because it was so thick or because that is some mysterious property of coconut milk, but boy, that was a surprise.

Here's a what we did for Our Lady of Guadalupe. We never got to any particular food, though I did add Mexican spices to the sausage, potato, egg, and cheese "scramble" I made for brunch.