One-Pot Cinnamon Roll Mash
Cinnamon roll flavor without dough, yeast, or an oven. Biscuit mix, cinnamon sugar, and a powdered cream cheese glaze.
- calories
- 720
- weight
- 5.5 oz
- cal / oz
- 131
- protein
- 11 g
- serves
- 1, scales
- prep
- 3 min
- cook
- 8 min
- total time
- 11 min
- water
- 180 ml boiled
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Breakfast
- Dessert
- Canister stove
- Alcohol / Esbit
- Car camping
- Backpacking
- Basecamp
- Bikepacking
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Just-add-water biscuit mix | 3/4 cup | the kind with shortening already in it |
|---|---|---|
| Powdered whole milk | 2 tbsp | |
| Brown sugar | 3 tbsp | packed |
| Ground cinnamon | 1 1/2 tsp | |
| White sugar | 1 tbsp | |
| Salt | 1/4 tsp | |
| Butter powder or ghee | 2 tbsp | ghee in a small jar is more calories and no rehydrating |
| Powdered sugar | 3 tbsp | |
| Cream cheese powder | 1 tbsp | sold for popcorn seasoning, keeps for months |
| Vanilla powder | 1/4 tsp | extract works but leaks |
Method
- Boil about 180 ml of water. Set roughly 2 tbsp aside in your mug or lid for the glaze.
- Take the pot off the heat. Pour the biscuit and milk powder bag in, then add the hot water a splash at a time, stirring, until it is a thick batter. Stop before it looks like pancake batter.
- Add the ghee, or the butter powder plus another splash of water, and fold it through.
- Scatter the cinnamon sugar bag over the top and cut it in with two or three lazy strokes. Do not stir it smooth. The streaks are the point.
- Put the pot back on the lowest flame you can hold. Lid on, four to five minutes, lifting the pot every thirty seconds so the bottom does not scorch. It is done when the middle is set and no longer sticks to the spoon.
- Stir the reserved hot water into the glaze bag a few drops at a time until it pours. Pour it over and eat from the pot.
A real cinnamon roll needs a yeasted dough, a rise, a rolling surface, and an oven. None of that exists at camp. What survives the translation is the actual payload: a rich sweet crumb, a cinnamon-sugar ribbon running through it, and a tangy sugar glaze on top. This builds all three in one pot in under ten minutes.
Biscuit mix replaces flour, yeast, egg, and butter in a single powder, so there is no proofing and nothing perishable. Powdered milk and cream cheese powder do the work of the fridge ingredients. The one thing worth getting right is the low flame and the frequent lift off the burner. A camp stove concentrates heat in a coin-sized spot and will burn the bottom black while the center is still raw batter.
Packing
Three bags per serving: biscuit mix with milk powder, the cinnamon sugar mix, and the glaze powders. Ghee travels in a small screw-top jar inside a ziplock.
Variations
- Chopped dates or raisins stirred into the batter cover the raisin-roll version.
- No stove: cold-soak the biscuit mix into a thick paste, glaze it, and eat it as a dough-ball. Grim, but it works.
- Swap the milk and cream cheese powders for coconut milk powder to make it dairy-free.
https://dontwastethecrumbs.com/quick-1-hour-cinnamon-rolls-recipe