My friend Pam is the cafeteria manager at a "rival" elementary school. She had this brilliant idea for a 5th grade fund raiser, have the kids take orders for cinnamon rolls. The kids then sold (or pre-sold) cinnamon rolls by the half dozen or dozen. Pam said she'd be in charge of making them.
The kids did their job well and pre-sold about 130 dozen cinnamon rolls!
Then Pam did her job. She rounded up parents from the school and her friends to make about 1600 cinnamon rolls (we ended up making more than that!). I'm in the friend category.
I'd set my alarm the night before, but forgot to turn it on. Fortunately for me, Jeff happened to wake up and nudged me asking what time I planned to get up! I got to the school by 5:30.
By the time I got over to the school, things were already up and running. Pam had been there since 4 getting the dough started. Kim had gotten there at 5 and they already had cinnamon rolls in the oven.
Pam put Kim and I in charge of the rolling. I'd forgotten the camera so at 7 (hoping he was awake and up) I called Jeff and asked him if he would pretty please bring the camera over. Being the wonderful husband he is, he did.
Here, Pam is getting a cinnamon roll to feed Jeff as a thank you.
The dough is made in a huge mixer and then divided into three
containers to sit and rise. If you look at these two pictures, you can see the
difference between dough that has risen and dough that hasn't.
The next step is to dump the dough out onto a floured surface.
We would start rolling before Kim had finished placing slices from the last
rolling onto pans.
Pam and I took turns rolling out the dough. The table top was
a bit high for me and at times my back wouldn't let me put the rolling pressure
I needed to roll the dough thin enough.
Next, is too spread softened butter all over the dough. This is
a very gooshy job.
I had problems with Kim wanting to sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar
before I was ready. I was constantly having to warn her off! We mix the cinnamon/sugar
in a large container and then pour it into smaller ones for sprinkling.
Next up, rolling the dough into a long log. Two sets of hands
helps this process go so much better.
Okay, time to slice.
24 slices are put onto large cookie sheets and then baked. Roxanne
was in charge of watching the ovens and cooking the cinnamon rolls to a perfectly
brown color.
The baked cinnamon rolls were slipped, parchment paper and all
onto clean cafeteria tables. we had a bunch of ladies who did the frosting and
boxing, but when Jeff showed up to take a photo of them they scattered to avoid
the camera. LOL
These boxes each hold half a dozen cinnamon rolls. Some of them
could only hold four rolls because "someone" sliced them a little
too large. This photo does NOT show all the boxes we used!
We took breaks throughout the morning whenever we could. Kim seemed
to be on the phone or texting messages constantly. she is definitely of the
newer generation!
The cinnamon rolls were supposed to be all picked up by 10,
but that didn't happen and we didn't leave until about 12:30. It was quite a
morning! Here are me, Pam, the lady who made up all the frosting (who's name
I forget *ack!*), and Kim. We still weren't done at the time of this picture.
We had still more to make.
To thank us for our help, Pam took Kim and I to lunch. She didn't need to do that, we're her friends and were happy to do it. It was a very fun morning.