Chase Freedom Rewards 5x Grocery Bonus Sunday Brunch: Cinnamon Rolls

Welcome to the fourth in our Chase Freedom / Trader Joe's series of maximizing Chase Ultimate Rewards points using the Chase Freedom card and Chase Exclusives while eating well for less. Here are the past posts:

We're now up to $620 in spend via 13 transactions. With Chase Exclusives, that equates to:

620 base points

2480 bonus points (4x, on top of 1x base)

62 as 10% bonus on 550 base

130 for 10 bonus points for each of 13 transactions

3292 Total

Today's brunch, Cinnamon Rolls, is a bit of a cheat: it's not a totally “from scratch” recipe, but apart from the time to let it rise and bake, it's easy and not time consuming. I used a cinnamon bun mix from King Arthur Flour that includes the sweet bread mix with yeast, Vietnamese cinnamon filling, and glaze (if you want it–I didn't use it). While it's not hard of course to pick up flour and yeast at the store, the mix is a bit more foolproof, and I like the natural dough conditioner (made of whey, milk protein and corn flour) that it contains, as it helps give it a lighter texture than I could likely achieve on my own. Now, I know you could just get store-bought cinnamon rolls, but they're usually not really that good, either tastewise or in terms of the quality of ingredients. Plus, if you have a child, it's fun for them to help make this–kids often love kneading dough.

The mix has you add your own butter and eggs, and I'd recommend buying organic. In fact, if you can only afford to buy or eat one thing that is organic, it should be butter. Pesticides and toxins tend to concentrate in an animal's fat, so it's even more important to buy and use organic butter than, say, skim milk (unless of course you never use butter in anything but do drink tons of milk). Of course, if you eat a lot of high fat dairy–cheese, whole fat milk, yogurt, etc.–it would be best if it's all organic.

Anyway, on to the cost, points, prep time and shopping list:

Cost: ~$12 for 9 cinnamon buns (prorated for amount of ingredients used: $10 for mix and $2 for added ingredients)

UR Points:

Only 12.2 points for the prorated $2 spent on Trader Joe's ingredients; but see our total UR points above for total earned to date on grocery spend of $620

~45 points can be earned for the mix (order it online using the link above), if paying with a $500 Visa gift card bought at an Office Depot using the Ink Bold

Preparation time: 20 minutes

Total rising and baking time: ~3 hours

Shopping List, Cinnamon Buns

King Arthur Flour Cinnamon Roll Mix
Trader Joe's organic unsalted butter
Trader Joe's cage free eggs
Trader Joe's pecan pieces (optional)

Chase Freedom Rewards 5x Grocery Bonus Sunday Brunch: Cinnamon Rolls

Cinnamon Buns (Makes 9)

Directions are of course on the back of the mix, but here's a summary with photos:

Empty the yeast packet into a bowl. Add 1/2 cup lukewarm water (make sure it's not too hot, or it will kill the yeast and the rolls won't rise). Add the dough mix and salt (I also added a dash of nutmeg and cardamom and a little vanilla extract for a little extra flavor) then make a well and add two eggs:

Add softened butter (I used the lower amount, 4 tablespoons) and need with your hands until the dough becomes smooth:

Cover with a clean dish towel and let rise in a warm place for about an hour. Then, on either a Silpat mat or a piece of waxed paper, roll out the dough into a large rectangle. Directions say 14″ x 18′ but I just rolled mine to about 11″ x 15″. I don't even own a rolling pin, so I just used a drinking glass-worked fine.
Mix the filling mix with 3 tablespoons of water into a thick paste, then spread over the rectangle, leaving a small border of dough around all 4 edges. Sprinkle with pecan pieces and/or organic raisins if desired.

Roll up into a log. Directions say to start with the short edge, but since I'd rolled it into a smaller rectangle I started with the long edge. Cut into 9 equal pieces and put them into a greased 9″ x 9″ pan. At this point, I covered tightly with plastic wrap and refrigerated overnight, so that it would be faster the next morning.

If you don't refrigerate the dough, let the rolls rise 1-1.5 hours, until puffy, then bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 28 minutes. If, as with me, you refrigerated the rolls, let them rise 1.5 hours or until puffy and bake. If you're using the glaze mix (I didn't) let the rolls cool for about 10 minutes before glazing.hh