Finnish Cinnamon Rolls (Pulla)

Oct 3

If there’s one Finnish recipe I want to share with you, it is this one. And — guessing from the enthusiasm each time I mention pullas on any social media — if there’s one Finnish recipe YOU want me to share with you, it is this one.

The cinnamon rolls, which we call pulla, is our culinary classic. Everyone loves them. Friends from abroad who have visited Finland raves about pulla years later. It’s the baked treat my husband and daughter most often ask me to make.

Here in Helsinki, every single café sells them. There’s even a pullabiili (“Cinnamon roll mobile”), an innovation of Patisserie Teemu Aura, that goes around town to a different neighborhood each day and brightening the day of the residents. It’s been a total hit.

You get the point: Finns — and visitors — love their pulla.

(Strictly speaking, pulla refers to any sweet buns made with this dough. The cinnamon rolls in this recipe are actually called korvapuusti, which literally means “slap on the ear” because the cinnamon swirl sort of looks like an ear. Yeah. So we’ll go with pulla because it doesn’t evoke 19th-century methods of disciplining children, and it’s far easier for most non-Finns to pronounce.)

Pulla making is full of sweet traditions. Eating some unbaked dough in the process is a given if there are some small hands involved. So is eating the oven-fresh pulla with coffee or a glass of cold milk.

Tips for your pulla baking success:

Pulla is best made with fresh yeast. But I have made it many times with dry active yeast in the U.S., where fresh yeast isn’t always easy to find, and had equal success.
The recipe calls for ground cardamom. This is widely available in grocery stores in Finland but again, I haven’t always found it in the U.S. That’s when I buy whole cardamom and either grind it with a coffee grinder or use the low-tech method: put the cardamom inside a small plastic bag and pound with a hammer, mallet, or the equivalent.
To get soft pullas, use the smallest amount of flour you can get away with. You’ll want the dough to not be so sticky you can’t handle it, of course. But as soon as you get to the point where it’s not impossibly sticky, stop adding flour. My mom’s tip, which comes from my grandmother, is to add flour until the ball of dough separates easily from the edges of the bowl as you mix it.
Avoid any kind of draft while the dough is rising. This is another bit of advice from my mom. I have no idea if it actually makes a difference.

Ingredients

Dough

50 g fresh yeast OR 20 g (about 6 tsp) dry active yeast
5 dl = 2 cups and 2 tbsp whole milk
2 eggs
2 dl = ¾ cup and 2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt
1 tbsp ground cardamom
16 dl = 830 g = 6 and 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
150 g = 11 tbsp butter, very soft

Filling

100 g = 7 tbsp butter, very soft
1 dl = just under ½ cup sugar
2 tbsp ground cinnamon

To brush & sprinkle on top

1 egg

coarse sugar

The Process

Warm milk to body temperature and dissolve the yeast. Add eggs, sugar, spices and half of the flour. Mix until the batter is evenly mixed. I do this by hand but you can also use a food processor with a dough hook.

Start adding the remaining flour, little by little. Add flour until the ball of dough starts to separate from the edge of the bowl easily as you mix it. Only use as much flour as you can get away with, as that will make the softest cinnamon rolls.

Towards the end, add the very soft butter and mix well again. You may have to add some flour as the butter makes the dough much more moist. Start kneading and knead until the dough is soft and bouncy. Cover with a clean kitchen towel until it has risen to twice the original volume.

In the meantime, soften the butter for the filling, and mix the sugar and cinnamon together in a small bowl. Cover 2-3 baking sheets with parchment paper.

Divide the risen dough into two. On a floured surface, roll out one half of it with a rolling pin into a rectangle. The dough may be a bit sticky; add flour as needed to roll it out, but try not to overdo it to keep a soft, springy consistency. Aim for a thickness of no more than 1 cm/ 1/3 inch for the rectangle.

Spread the softened butter evenly on top of the rectangle. Sprinkle with the sugar and cinnamon mix.

Starting from the long side of the rectangle, start rolling up the dough. Try to keep your roll as tight as you can. Turn the seam side to the bottom and cut out the ends (these often disappear into someone’s mouth, or they make sweet little pullas in the oven too. There are a few different ways of cutting the roll, but this is how we do it in my family: using a sharp knife, cut once halfway through the roll, once all the way through the roll. Lift up the piece that’s formed in this way and place it on the baking sheet with the swirl-side up, separating the cut-out pieces a little so that it’s shaped like a heart if you look at it from above. Continue in this way through the roll and place all pieces on the baking sheet. Let rise again under a kitchen towel while you heat up the oven and prepare the second half of the dough in the same way.

There are a few different ways of cutting the roll up into pulla pieces. This is how we do it in my family: using a sharp knife, cut once halfway through the roll, and next to it another slice all the way through the roll. Lift up the piece that’s cut out in this way and place it on the baking sheet with the swirl-side up, separating the cut-out pieces a little so that it’s shaped like a heart if you look at it from above. Continue in this way through the roll and place all pieces on the baking sheet. Let rise again under a kitchen towel while you heat up the oven and prepare the second half of the dough in the same way.

Heat the oven to 225 C / 430 F. Mix one egg with a tbsp of water in a cup. Once your pullas have risen some more, brush with the egg mixture and sprinkle with coarse sugar. Bake in the center of the oven for about 8-10 minutes, or until golden brown.

Enjoy!

Mari Stuart