I love making cinnamon rolls (and raspberry rolls). They’re so delicious, and really not that hard to make – but they do take a long time. We’re talking three hours start to finish. So when a cinnamon roll craving hits, it’s pretty hard to satisfy it immediately. That’s why I started making these super easy cinnamon twists – they start with refrigerated breadsticks, so they’re crazy fast – you can have a batch ready in under half and hour. They’re crazy easy too – older kids would have no trouble making these.
We like the cinnamon twists from a local pizza place, but they won’t deliver just cinnasticks, so it’s faster to make our own than it is to drive down to the pizza place to pick some up. I keep a couple tubes of breadsticks in the fridge for when we want a sweet treat, and the other ingredients are things I always have on hand. You can find a printable recipe card at the end of the post.
Here’s how easy it is to make them:
1 – mix cinnamon and sugar on a plate. melt butter in a bowl. 2 – unroll breadsticks and stretch slightly, dip in butter. 3 – roll in cinnamon and sugar. 4 – fold breadstick in half and twist together. 5 – bake, frost, and eat!
I make a really simple frosting from softened cream cheese, powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla. As long as you soften the cream cheese in the microwave, you can just stir the frosting ingredients together with a whisk or beater (it will seem clumpy and thick and first, but after a few seconds of stirring it will come together).
Easy Cinnamon Twists w/ Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients
Cinnamon Twists
- 1 can Refrigerated Breadstick Dough 12 breadsticks
- 3 tablespoons Butter
- 2/3 cup Sugar
- 1.5 tablespoons Cinnamon
Frosting
- 2 oz Cream Cheese
- 2/3 cup Powdered Sugar
- 2 teaspoons Milk
- 1/4 teaspoon Vanilla
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Melt butter in a small bowl.
- Combine sugar and cinnamon on a plate.
- Unroll and separate breadsticks.
- Stretch one breadstick slightly, dip in butter, then roll in cinnamon sugar.
- Fold breadstick in half and twist together, then place on cookie sheet.
- Repeat with remaining breadsticks to make 12 cinnamon twists.
- Bake for 12-14 minutes until cooked through but still very soft.
- Soften cream cheese, then beat or whisk together with other frosting ingredients.
- Place frosting in a plastic bag, cut off one corner.
- When twists are done baking, "pipe" frosting out of bag onto each twist.
For any bread purists out there, you should know that these are very good. However, they are not quite as pillowy soft as they would be make with homemade breadstick dough. Using homemade dough will take lots longer (2+ hours), but if you’d prefer to do it that way, you can use this amazing breadsticks recipe for the dough – it would probably make closer to 20 twists, so you’d need to increase the other ingredients accordingly.
Nan says
Recipes are gr8!! They are so easy-to-use that I found this site at 2:00am and I had to try and make the German Chocolate snack bars which turned out great so it’s 5:00am now and I’ve baked up a storm. So I’ll deliver them to my husband’s job on his lunch break. Thanks for these easy-to-use recipes. You’ll have an office of attorney’s smiling and chewing for lunch.
Liz says
Love easy ‘recipes especially for anything cinnamon!
plasterer bristol says
These are my absloute favorite of all time. Would love to be able to make them myself.. Thanks for sharing this recipe.
Simon
Sandy Sands says
Fast, easy and delicious recipes!! Thank you!!
Jess says
Could I make these with puff pastry?
Karina Rodriguez Acevedo says
I have heard that Pillsbury breadstick dough has been discontinued. Do you know about this? Do you have any other suggestions for a breadstick no that’s not Pillsbury? That is refrigerated. Thanks
Jennie Leigh says
Now these look GOOD! A quick, easy way to get my cinnamon and sugar fix.. I’ll take it! Great post, great recipe! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
Pat says
Please sign me up…..Its not working
Hannah says
Do you think you could use crescent roll dough instead of breadsticks?
autumn says
I don’t know why not. Just try not to squish the dough much. Actually, instead of shaping them into breadsticks I’d probably just brush on the butter and spread cinnamon sugar on, then roll them up like normal crescents – I think they’ll puff better that way. Good luck!
autumn says
you’ve been added!
Tia Nammouur says
thank you!
autumn says
got you added! You should start getting emails tomorrow morning – thanks!
raven williams says
would this work out with cocoa powder??
Diane Dodd says
Please add me to your list. Easy and good. That’s exactly what I like.
SARA says
I’ve been waiting for this recipe! 😉
autumn says
glad you like it 🙂
Lori Woolard says
Can’t wait to try the spinach tree
Autumn says
Trying to subscribe to blog, the subscribe button doesn’t seem to work and tried emailing a few weeks ago, but no repsonse.
autumn says
So sorry! Totally backed up on emails. I just went to add you to the list and it looks like you already got yourself added – thank you! PS – last time I ordered pizza when I got there they had written my name down as “Odom.” Nice.