Cinnamon buns fall while cooling - a problem
I made a 9x12 pan of cinnamon buns and I've got a problem. I have made this recipe several times, and the buns taste Great! In making them the dough feels great, it rises nicely, the buns roll out and cut just fine, and after the second rise they look simply awesome! Even when they come out of the oven they look (and smell) wonderful. However, as they cool, the center two buns "fall". I make 12 buns in my 9x12 metal cake pan (3 rows of 4 buns). The outer buns stay nice and tall on the side next to the pan wall, but slope toward the center of the pan. The center two buns are maybe half the height of the outer edge, and maybe half as tall as they were when they came out of the oven.
I suspect my problem has to do with oven temperature and time, but I follow the recipe I have religiously (375' oven; 18-20 minutes). After 20 minutes the buns are quite brown on top, and I would hesitate to leave them in longer as I fear they would become too dark. Any suggestions???
Do you take the breads temp? It sounds like the middle of the pan is not getting cooked all the way. Bread is generally done at 195°C
Have you checked to make sure your oven is truly at 375? The temperature is off by quite a bit in many ovens. You'll need an oven thermometer to check. The falling center sounds underdone to me too.
Marni
Thanks Alabubba and Marni. I agree, they sound underdone.
Alabubba, I have not taken the temperature of the buns. I usually do this from the bottom of a loaf when I make bread. I assume I can do this through the top of the cinnamon buns?
Marni - I actually have taken the temperature of my oven, and I'm not off by much (<5'F). In addition I allowed the oven to warm up a full hour before baking yesterday. I do have a baking stone, but didn't use it yesterday. I have used it before and had similar "falling" results. I always kind of blamed the stone for this, so I decided to go without the stone yesterday. Guess I was wrong :)
May try another batch tonight to see if I can measure the temperature in both the center and outer edge of the pan.
Does anyone think I should try lower temperature and longer time? (Say 350' for 40 minutes?)
Greg
Made another batch last night, and they turned out fine. I dropped the temperature to ~360'F, baked them for 35 minutes, and checked the temperature of the center buns. At 25 minutes they were only at 150', but by 35 minutes they were up to 197'.
They were getting pretty brown on top, so after 20 minutes I put a loose layer of foil on top which seemed to slow down the browning.
Thanks to all for your great advice!!