The Sticky Sticky Buns at Flour Bakery and Cafe achieved famed, star food status the year that I began working there.  Joanne’s win over Bobby Flay during a surprise throw down caused the production of these decadent baked goods to go through the roof! It was exciting, but after a month or two they quickly lost their “glimmer” as we all fell into bouts of “sticky bun over load”.  I began to pass them over on the snack tray, opting for the goodies of lesser status, biscotti and raspberry crumb bars.

However, I have been coaxed into enjoying them again and again whenever family comes to visit us in Boston.  Everyone wants to taste the winning sticky buns.  Bryan’s parents often request more than one visit to Flour during their stays here in Boston and rarely choose something other than the SB to go along with their coffee.  They are always impressively sweet and delicious and they become even more impressive when I make them at home.  I made them last Memorial Day for my mom, sister and brother in – law.  This past week while visiting my in-laws in Birmingham I decided to make them for my father in-law’s birthday breakfast.

While they are not has intimidating to make as one might assume, they do take some planning.  You need to start making them at least 2 days before you want to eat them.  I wanted to bake them on Wednesday morning, so I made the brioche dough and the goo on Monday afternoon.  I let it rest in the fridge until the following afternoon.  I then assembled the buns, rolling out the dough one half at a time.  Doing it this way will yield more, smaller buns.  I set the buns in the goo in the pan and put that back in the fridge overnight.  Finally, on Wednesday morning I took them out of the fridge and let them rise for 2 hours in a warm place.  I actually turned the oven on to 100 degrees for a few minutes, turned it off and put the buns in there to rise – it worked well!

Thirty minutes in the convection oven and they were beautifully browned and smelled amazing!  I let them cool for about 15 minutes and then used 2 forks to turn them out onto plates.  Everyone enjoyed at least 2 with a couple of cups of coffee.  Making the multiple visits to Flour during their trips north is fun for my in-laws, but there is something a little more fun about lounging around in your robe and slippers while feasting on fresh from the oven Sticky Sticky Buns!

I made the recipe as written in the Flour Cookbook – the recipe can be found here.