Cinnamon Roll French Toast Bake
Canned cinnamon rolls, a powdered-egg custard, and a foil-lined pot. Camp breakfast that takes forty minutes and is worth it.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 6 oz
- cal / oz
- 103
- protein
- 8 g
- serves
- 8, scales
- prep
- 10 min
- cook
- 40 min
- total time
- 50 min
- water
- 180 ml cold
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Breakfast
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Canoe / raft
- Vegetarian
- Foil packet
- Grab and go
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Refrigerated cinnamon rolls | 2 cans | keep the icing pucks; they ride in the cooler |
|---|---|---|
| Butter | 1/2 cup | one stick |
| Sugar | 1/3 cup | |
| Powdered whole eggs | 5 tbsp | stands in for 2 eggs, plus 5 tbsp water |
| Powdered heavy cream or full-fat milk powder | 1/3 cup | reconstituted with 3/4 cup water |
| Cinnamon | 3 tsp | |
| Nutmeg | 1/4 tsp | |
| Vanilla extract | 2 tsp | |
| Water | about 3/4 cup total |
Method
- Build a bed of coals or light 20 briquettes. You want roughly 8 under the oven and 16 on the lid, which puts you near 350°F.
- Line a 12-inch dutch oven with foil and grease the foil with a little of the butter.
- Melt the rest of the butter in a mug or small pot at the edge of the fire. Stir the sugar in until it stops feeling gritty.
- In a bowl, whisk the egg powder and cream powder into the water until there are no lumps. Add cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla, then pour in the buttered sugar and whisk again.
- Cut each cinnamon roll into quarters with a knife or scissors. Drop them in the custard and turn them over until every piece is wet.
- Tip everything into the oven, spread it flat, put the lid on, and bake 35 to 40 minutes. Rotate the oven a third turn and the lid the opposite way every ten minutes so it does not scorch on one side.
- It is done when the top is browned and the center no longer wobbles. Warm the icing pucks on the lid and spread them over the top before serving.
This is a home casserole moved outdoors with two swaps. Fresh eggs and heavy cream become powdered egg and powdered cream reconstituted with cold water, so the custard is stable in a pack and you are not nursing a carton of cream at 80 degrees. The canned rolls still need a cooler — there is no shelf-stable version of them that behaves the same way, so this is a car-camping or basecamp breakfast, not a backpacking one.
The butter-and-sugar syrup matters more than it looks. Poured into the custard it coats every cut face of dough, which is what keeps the interior from baking into plain bread. Coal placement is the other half: two-thirds of your heat goes on the lid, because heat from below turns the bottom layer to carbon long before the middle sets.
Packing
Cinnamon roll cans and butter live in the cooler; everything else is dry and can be premixed into one bag except the vanilla. Bring heavy foil — the sugar welds itself to bare cast iron.
Variations
- No dutch oven: bake it in a foil pan inside a covered grill over indirect heat, same time and temperature.
- Skip the icing and scatter dried cranberries and pecans over the top instead.
- Halve everything and use a 10-inch oven with 6 coals under, 12 on top.
https://mealswithmaria.site/monkey-cinnamon-roll-french-toast-bake