Cinnamon Sugar Cruffins

“What is a cruffin?” became a popular question after I posted a photo of the cinnamon sugar cruffins I made last weekend on Facebook and Instagram.

A cruffin is a delicate, flaky pastry made using laminated dough wrapped around a filling and then cut into servings that are baked in a muffin pan. The croissant like pastry bakes up and takes the shape of the muffin pan it bakes in. Combine the buttery puff pastry from a croissant with your choice of filling baked in the shape of a muffin and you have yourself a cruffin.

Last Saturday, I found myself wanting to bake something delicious for us to enjoy for Sunday’s breakfast. After a survey of the kitchen and pantry, I discovered that I had a stash of puff pastry in the freezer. That seemed like a good place to start.

While a package of puff pastry thawed out on the kitchen counter, I sat down with a cup of hot tea, a stack of cookbooks from the parlor bookshelves, and my phone to do a little browsing and decide what I should make. I didn’t want an all day project. I’m certainly not against one of those baking projects, especially these days, but that was not the sort of recipe I was looking for.

Instead, I wanted something rather simple. I wanted to enhance the delicious flavor and texture of puff pastry in a way that would be a delicious Sunday morning treat with our Sunday morning coffee. By the time I had finished my cup of tea, I had decided on making a batch of Cinnamon Sugar Cruffins.

While you could certainly choose to make your own puff pastry from scratch before transforming it into cruffins, I took the shortcut. I already had the puff pastry and I wanted to skip the lengthy process of creating the laminated puff pastry dough.

Thanks to that premade dough, I had the other ingredients and kitchen items gathered together in minutes. I set the oven to preheat, rolled up my sleeves, and started combining the dry ingredients for the cinnamon sugar mixture. I decided to apply the cinnamon sugar to the puff pastry using the same method I use when making cinnamon rolls. I spread the softened butter on the pastry, added a thick layer of the cinnamon sugar, and then gently pressed the cinnamon sugar into the butter and pastry with my hands. Then I started rolling the pastry up into a tight roll.

I prepped the baking pan with my homemade Magic Baking Pan Release Spread before using a paring knife to cut a long slit in the roll of filled pastry. I know that it seems counterintuitive to tightly roll something together taking great care to prevent ripping the delicate pastry only to cut it apart. Cutting this slit will allow the pastry to expand upwards and expose the delicious filling as the cruffins bake, creating a gorgeous looking pastry with a thick caramel like filling.

I finished the batch, moved the tray to the preheated oven, and looked at the big mess I had managed to make of the kitchen even when making such a simple recipe. That’s not all that uncommon. I will admit to being a messy baker. Luckily, I’m also good at being the cleanup detail.

As I cleaned up my mess, the cruffins began to warm up in the oven. As they did, the farmhouse kitchen was filled with a delicious aroma of brown sugar and cinnamon that made me certain that these pastries would be scrumptious. Once I took them out of the oven, I knew that based on how delicious they looked, we were in for a real treat.

While I had made these cruffins with the intention of enjoying them the next morning, a few of them didn’t make it that long. They just looked and smelled too delicious for us to wait. So we didn’t.

We helped ourselves to a round of warm cruffins. The kitchen became silent. We were too busy eating cruffins to speak. Then the chorus of reviews came in. It was unanimous: the cruffins were delicious. Add this recipe to my collection of breakfast recipes that I am certain we will enjoy time and time again. I hope that you’ll enjoy them as much as we did.

Once you’ve made this recipe, you might want to try…

I hope that you’ll give the recipes for Baked Sour Cream Donuts, Baked Blueberry and Chocolate Donuts, Fluffy Buttermilk Pancakes, and Buttermilk Waffles a try.

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Cinnamon Sugar Cruffins

Jennifer from 1840 Farm

The baking of these cruffins can be handled in two ways. You can bake the cruffins immediately after forming them for a quicker recipe and a firmer, more dense pastry. If you prefer, you can form the cruffins, cover them with a clean kitchen towel, and set them aside to rest and rise slightly for an hour or so before baking. Cruffins that have been allowed to rest will puff up more as they bake and create a lighter pastry with a more pronounced muffin shape. The flavor will be unchanged, but the length of time needed to create a batch of cruffins and the texture of the pastry will vary based on the method you choose.

Keep in mind that the puff pastry will only rise and expand slightly while baking unlike a muffin or cupcake that increases in size as it bakes . So, you should portion your cruffin dough accordingly, filling the cavities of your baking pan.

The size of your cruffins is entirely up to you. If you want small, snack size cruffins, I suggest making a dozen out of a package (two sheets) of puff pastry. If you want medium cruffins, a batch of eight would do nicely. If you have a jumbo muffin pan, a batch of six large cruffins will result in bakery size cruffins.

Author: Jennifer from 1840 Farm

Ingredients

• 1 package (2 sheets) puff pastry , refrigerated or at cool room temperature
• ⅓ cup granulated sugar
• ⅓ cup brown sugar
• 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 pinch salt
• 4 Tablespoons butter , softened

Instructions

• Preheat your oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit for immediate baking unless you plan to allow your cruffins to rest and rise. To rest and rise, proceed with the recipe to shape your cruffins and preheat your oven after the dough has rested and you are ready for baking. Prepare your muffin pan by brushing each cavity with Baking Pan Release Spread or with baking pan spray.
• In a small bowl, mix the cinnamon sugar filling. Combine the sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Mix until well combined. Transfer two tablespoons of this mixture to a small bowl to reserve it for adding to the tops of your cruffins before baking.
• Unwrap your puff pastry and lay it out flat on your work surface. If the pastry is resistant to unfolding or unrolling, cover it with a clean kitchen towel and allow it to warm up for a few minutes. You should be able to open it up to a flat sheet when it is at room temperature.
• If small tears or fissures occur, gently press the dough back together using your fingers. Try not to overwork the dough, much like with pie crust. Less is more and we want to preserve the delicate nature of the puff pastry while also mending any breaks.
• Most recipes call for the sheet of puff pastry to be rolled out to a larger sheet before proceeding. I have found that this step is unnecessary, so I skip it. If you prefer, you can certainly roll your sheet of pastry into a larger and thinner rectangle using as little flour as necessary to prevent the dough from sticking to your rolling pin.
• Using an offset spatula or the back of a large spoon, spread half of the softened butter across the entire surface of the first sheet of pastry. This butter will be the adhesive to allow the cinnamon sugar to stick to the pastry, so try to make sure that it covers the surface from edge to edge.
• Add approximately half of the cinnamon sugar filling to the buttered layer of pastry. Use your hands to gently spread the filling to cover the entire sheet. Press gently to encourage the cinnamon sugar to adhere to the layer of butter.
• Carefully begin rolling the sugared sheet of pastry into a tight roll starting with one of the long ends. Roll as tightly as possible while taking care not to stretch the dough more than necessary and trying to keep the edges in line with their original shape. Allow the rolled pastry to rest with the seam on the bottom and repeat the entire process with the other sheet.
• Once you have two sheets of filled, rolled puff pastry, it’s time to decide what size cruffins you would like to make. You can make twelve small snack sized cruffins, 8 medium cruffins, or 6 jumbo cruffins (with a jumbo muffin pan) out of the two sheets of pastry. I make 8 or 12 when I bake them, but the choice is entirely up to you.
• Carefully lay a rolled and filled sheet of the puff pastry in front of you on your work surface. Using a sharp paring knife, cut a slit down the length of the roll that reaches about a third of its depth. I know that this seems counterintuitive after carefully rolling your pastry without breaking it. This slit will allow the pastry to expand upwards and expose the delicious filling as the cruffins bake, creating a gorgeous looking pastry with a thick caramel like filling.
• With the slit pastry roll in front of you, divide the roll into even pieces according to your baking plan. In my case, I was making a dozen cruffins, so I divided each roll of dough into six even pieces. Cut them apart using a paring knife and then carefully pick up each piece, form it into a rounded shape, and place it into the cavity of your prepared muffin pan.
• Continue this process until all of your cruffins are resting in the muffin pan. Using the cinnamon sugar mixture you reserved earlier, sprinkle the tops of each cruffin with an equal amount of the cinnamon sugar. If you are baking immediately, transfer the baking pan to the preheated oven. If you prefer to allow the pastry to rest and rise, cover the pan with a clean kitchen towel and allow it to rest undisturbed for an hour or so before preheating the oven to 425 degrees and baking as usual.
• Bake the cruffins for five minutes at 425 degrees before reducing the oven temperature down to 375 degrees. This high heat encourages the buttery pastry to expand and create light, flaky layers. Reducing the temperature slightly helps to prevent overbrowning and burning the sugar as the pastry bakes.
• Bake for approximately 20 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and check for doneness. The pastry should be crisp and covered in a layer of cinnamon sugar glaze. Jumbo cruffins might need another 4-5 minutes to bake through.
• When finished baking, place the muffin pan on a wire rack to cool slightly. The cinnamon sugar will be very hot, so take care to allow the pan to cool for five to ten minutes before removing the cruffins from the pan. Remove the cruffins and transfer to the wire rack to cool completely.

Notes

Cruffins, like most pastries made with laminated dough, are best eaten the day they are made or within 24 hours. They can be kept at room temperature for several days in a covered container and reheated before serving. I like to warm my leftover cruffins in my toaster oven which keeps the exterior crisp. They can also be warmed in the microwave in ten second increments until warmed to your liking.

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