Forward by Goldenstar:
Kiarane and I really wanted to do something special to say goodbye to Clover. In case you didn’t know, Clover is an amazing cook and had a section in the Free People’s Press as well as on the forums for recipe sharing.
Kia and I decided on making one of the recipes together as an appropriate way to say goodbye to one of the nicest community team members we have ever met. We had trouble deciding which recipe to do so Merric decided for us by selecting a recipe called “Easy Yummy Sticky Buns” we got from the forums.
The cooking of the sticky buns for me was pretty straight forward. I bought the ingredients and made it as instructed with the help of my assistant, Baby Hobbit. The next morning we baked it up and enjoyed the heck out of it.
I did find it very easy and it was incredibly delicious. I think I’ll be making this again as a special treat during the holidays. Thank you, Clover!
I had figured that Kia being the cooking master she is had a similarly easy time. Not so. Apparently this recipe is very easy for those living in the U.S. with U.S. ingredients and of course have English as their first language. Below is Kia’s adventures in making this delicious treat.
Adventures in Sticky Buns by Kiarane
We had it all figured out with Goldenstar; we’d chosen the recipe, scheduled a cooking day, clarified the process. Everything was supposed to go on wheels. Except it didn’t, of course. Let me share with you the story of the not-so-easy-sticky buns recipe and how even an experienced kitchen raider like myself can wipe from time to time.
How it’s supposed to go:
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Thaw 2 loaves of frozen bread in refrigerator. (You need to make them the day before you bake them!)
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Butter a 9×13 pan and with butter.
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Sprinkle with chopped walnuts.
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Cut the dough into walnut size pieces and place in bottom of pan.
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Melt 1 stick butter, add 6 oz vanilla (not instant) pudding, 1 tablespoon milk, 2 teaspoons cinnamon and 1 cup brown sugar. Heat together, blend good and pour over dough.
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Refrigerate overnight.
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Bake at 350 for 30 minutes and turn out of pan. (Do this right away or they will stick!)
How it really went:
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Thaw…
Wait, wait. I’m not even in the kitchen yet that I need to get back at my computer. Thanks to Google translate, I learned ‘’thaw’’ means ‘’unfroze’’. Weh, crisis avoided. Ok, let’s get back at it.
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Thaw 2 loaves of frozen bread in refrigerator.
First mistake: send the husband do the groceries.
Sam: Love, I can’t find the frozen bread.
Kia: (Who never saw any frozen bread her entire life but had complete faith in Goldenstar’s information about the said-bread) It’s in the frozen goods section honey, look harder.
Sam: I’m pretty sure there is no such thing as frozen uncooked bread in here.
Kia: YES THERE IS. FIND THE BAKER, KILL SOMEONE, ANYTHING, I NEED THAT BREAD.
Did I mention that Goldenstar and I have different grocery store brands, let alone live in different countries? Pff, details! Anyway, still don’t know how he managed, but I got my bread.
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Butter a 9×13 pan and with butter.
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Sprinkle with chopped walnuts.
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Cut the dough into walnut size pieces and place in bottom of pan.
Got this. I feel like I’m getting more confidence here.
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Melt 1 stick butter…
Oh boy: ‘’1 stick butter’’. How many people really know how much is a stick butter? Me, for instance, I have no idea. I have to get back at the computer, find my friend Martha S. and get right quantity. A stick is actually half a cup. Mission accomplished, moving on.
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Melt 1 stick butter, add 6 oz vanilla (not instant) pudding….
Not so fast! We’re counting in oz now. The only thing that I’m able to count in oz is vodka and I always get the measurement wrong. Back to the computer (for the third time), find out an once is equal to 125 ml.
Get the pudding. Wait. Make the pudding, remember the first mistake of the night? Yeah, husband got instant pudding. But of course, it gets better: NO MORE MILK. At this point, I actually have to get dress, go outside in the lovely cold Canadian weather and get milk. Pheeew. When I got back, I was totally oom. Needed a bit of that miss-measured vodka.
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Refrigerate overnight.
Sleep. Can do sleep. No worries. Ahem, especially after the mana potion.
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Bake at 350 for 30 minutes and turn out of pan. (Do this right away or they will stick!)
And we did it! I actually downed that boss, and it was absolutely delicious. Thank you again Clover, for the crazy stories, the yummy food and all the fun!
November 6, 2012 at 9:04 am
Yup .. International cooking experiences!!
When I trained as a Patissier, here in the US, all of our study material was in weights, not measures .. so a stick of butter would have caused even professional cooking students LOTS of trouble.
Luckily our texts were in English as well as thier Metric equivalents .. that way you were able to use whatever scale was available at the time.
Golly, I miss Clover!
Thank you for putting this together.
Wyllo
November 6, 2012 at 9:19 am
Might sound like silly questions but…
Is the frozen bread actual baked bread or uncooked dough thats frozen? Most bread in my freezer comes from my oven and is made using various beers.
Vanilla pudding? A custard type of thing or more yogurty? fluid or regular ounces can make a lot of difference, but custard means eggwhites for meringues or a pav.
From memory a stick of butter is 4oz so about half a regular 250g pack of butter.
November 6, 2012 at 10:21 am
It is frozen uncooked dough. It’s very easy to find in my local grocery stores. It came in packs of 5 and is in the frozen bread section like near the dinner rolls and garlic toast.
Vanilla pudding that’s not instant. We just bought jello brand vanilla pudding that didn’t say instant on the box. It came in the correct oz size so there was no measuring, just buying the box. We didn’t add any eggs or anything – just the powdered box of pudding.
For reference. a stick of butter = 1/2 of a cup or 4oz
I don’t know anything about grams
November 6, 2012 at 10:28 am
Example frozen bread package:
The frozen loaf itself looks like this:
I’m sure if you just had fresh bread dough, that’d be fine
November 6, 2012 at 1:23 pm
I live in the US, but I’ve never seen or heard of this frozen uncooked bread phenomenon. It sounds useful though!
November 6, 2012 at 10:16 am
For the record, there actually was no frozen bread in my grocery store! The husband had to ask the baker for one of his uncooked frozen loaf of bread: he sold it the same price as a cooked one. Hehe.
November 8, 2012 at 5:59 pm
Nice bonus husband points!
Looks delicious. I hope you enjoyed every bit.
November 6, 2012 at 11:26 am
lolol
i enjoyed this read, it reminded me of how lost I am when I go to my husbands welsh cottage (we’re live mostly in US now). totally lost over there with such things as ‘gas mark 1′, weird fridges, even stranger stoves. dont get me going about the showers… …lololol
we usually end up going down the street to the local curry shop. hah
I make a similar thing called monkey bread, but use the frozen yeast buns already cut small and arranged in a tin foil base for extra ease. this recipe looks good with the pudding in it tho, will give it a try
November 6, 2012 at 1:23 pm
Yeah .. monkey bread !
yummmm
November 6, 2012 at 5:54 pm
It did remind me of Monkey Bread since it was in little tear apart bites.
November 6, 2012 at 1:22 pm
I live in the US, and I have never seen or heard of this frozen uncooked bread phenomenon. It sounds handy though!
I had a similar experience when I went to live in France: suddenly all the recipes were either based on weight or in metric measures, and I had no idea how to even guess estimates for any of them. I spent a lot of time on the Internet, looking up conversions and hunting for recipes I could understand. It was challenging, to say the least!
November 6, 2012 at 3:06 pm
LoL I had a blast reading Kia’s part. Congrats to both accomplishments and glad you were able to enjoy an authentic Clover recipe!
November 6, 2012 at 4:33 pm
May I just say Merric looks fantastic! Who is that man? Congrats, Merric!
November 14, 2012 at 7:48 pm
I just made these tonight. Word of caution: Make sure you have a large enough pan. I bypassed the 9×13 pan suggested in the instructions and went with a pie plate (which is what I though Kia used in her picture). My house quickly filled up with smoke as the brown sugar mixture bubbled over the sides and dripped all over the inside of my oven. Also, the middle of the sticky buns was still doughy after 30 minutes of baking.
I’m going to try it again for Thanksgiving, but this time I’ll use a larger pan and possibly make a ring with the dough bits so that it cooks all the way through.