Just mention cinnamon rolls to my siblings and the thought will trigger a welcomed aroma that brings back memories with smiles.  This delicious pastry was beyond description. Your nostrils could only surrender as the baked cinnamon filled the air. Sometimes the bottom of the oven caught the drippings from the melted icing, only to intensify the smell and our can’t-wait-to-taste eagerness. 

My sister’s now-famous cinnamon rolls were very popular and frequently requested in our house. Unlike the too-sweet prepackaged bakery-bought rolls, these were homemade, fresh, and mouth-watering.

Lucky for us, our oldest sister was very serious about making the perfect cinnamon roll. Anetha (#1) was among a class of students who were required to take a course called”home economics”. You learned how to manage a household, sew, plan, and cook meals. But check this out, you ate the meals you prepared in class.

Once perfected, Anetha made her beloved cinnamon rolls whenever our Mother agreed to purchase the extra ingredients. But they were most popular in the winter months. Growing up in a cold climate, we appreciate meals that were oven-baked, grilled, stewed, smothered, or needed to spread butter on.

Saturdays were the best days to prep the rolls because it was an all-day process. Although I mainly just observed. I regret not asking my sister if I could participate. I know she would have taught me. But I was too intimidated by the perfect swirl, shape, and taste of her cinnamon rolls. I probably could have done more than measure how fast and how high the yeast made the dough rise.

A few years later, I too was required to take home economics, sewing, and domestic life preparation for managing a home. I honestly thought our class would be taught the art of the perfect cinnamon roll, but that class was never offered to us.

Adding to this was a social movement to prepare women for the same careers men excelled in. As the good housekeeping curriculum was slowly removed from being required, to an option, enrollment declined. My personal focus shifted to a bigger issue, surviving the 8th grade and the next social experiment called high school.

My sister married and began her family, but lucky for us throughout her life she would occasionally inform us when she was going to make cinnamon rolls.

We each found our way to her kitchen door, in search of that melt-in-your-mouth aroma, and 20-plus cinnamon rolls on wax paper. Our quick visits ended with sticky fingers and a smile.

What was so special about the cinnamon rolls? 

When you are from a very large family, we usually have the basics. I am talking peanut butter, yes, jelly not always. Ice cream? Sometimes yes, ice cream and cookies, maybe, if for a birthday party. Extra ingredients for anything special were rare. If the food items did not create a meal, it was more than likely not placed on the grocery list.

My Mother on occasion would happily get the extra ingredients for Anetha’s cinnamon rolls.

My siblings and I had something uniquely in common. We spent a lot of our time with outside friends with smaller families than ours. They were usually friends who did not have to share a bedroom and had a television to watch what they wanted to watch.

But if Anetha starts pulling out the flour, cinnamon, raisins, walnuts, and rolling pin, the cinnamon rolls will bring us home early. Often the friends would come too. Our Mother knew this.

What I am about to say is at the top of the cliche list, but…

Now more than ever, families need connection and purpose to maintain their legacy. You may wonder what any of this has to do with connection? I think it illustrates at some point in our lives, we need to connect.  We need one another. Just like flour alone, cinnamon alone is not all that. But together POW! Then you add the other ingredients (ask Anetha) but most importantly you have to include LOVE.

For the record, a few years ago, my sister Anetha (#1) sent me her handwritten recipe for the award-winning cinnamon rolls. When I am preparing to cook, ( yes, I did learn how to cook) I skip over her letter frequently in search of another recipe.

I suppose in a way, I still feel intimidated by the possibility of not measuring up. Or perhaps it is knowing the cinnamon rolls brought us all together. If only it was that easy today.

FC Hickombottom