After you try a slice of this cinnamon raisin bread , you’ll never want to buy store bought again! What about the fact that you bake once and get 3 loaves? This recipe is easy, convenient and a money saver!
My family loves cinnamon everything. From cinnamon fruit roll-ups to Cinnabon pancakes and everything else in between.
When I met my husband, back in 2000, he would make cinnamon raisin toast for himself upon returning home from our night class in graduate school. Crispy, cinnamon-y and buttery bread dipped in cold white milk is still one of his favorite things to eat late at night.
Naturally, our kids love cinnamon raisin bread. Our favorite store bought brand is $4.30 and the loaf at a local bread store (Harvest Bread Company) is $6.50! Yikes! Luckily, I figured out a simple recipe that could handle whole wheat flour and make my own much much cheaper.
Of course, when so many of us love cinnamon raisin bread a single loaf can be eaten in a day! Especially, when it’s fresh out the oven and the whole house smells like a bakery! Yummmmm!
Did I mention this bread also makes the best French toast ever? Well, I’m telling you now. You will have out-of-this-world French toast with this bread. Just make sure you cut the slices a little thicker so the egg absorbs well and they don’t come out soggy.
Oh, and let’s not forget that this bread also makes my favorite lunch ever: a grilled almond butter and banana sandwich! So yes, a single loaf can be eaten rather quickly.
Let’s be honest, I don’t have time to make a fresh loaf every other day, and neither do you! But, what I can do is bake three loaves, keep one out to eat, and freeze the other two! Same amount of work triple the rewards. I love this deal. Don’t you?
You can omit the raisins in this bread recipe or keep them. Trust me, after baking this recipe, you’ll never want to buy a loaf again.
Of course, should you decide to make these loaves after dinner… give yourself permission to have a hot slice out of the oven right before bed. With butter. Yes. Butter makes it better. That is what maw maw Schneller would say. I’m sure she’d love this recipe too.
Oh, and if you make this recipe and loved it, make sure to come back and let others know by leaving a comment below. Enjoy!
Homemade Cinnamon Raisin Bread Recipe – Easy!
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 3 hours 40 mins
- Total Time: 4 hours
- Yield: 3 loaves 1x
- Category: Breads
Ingredients
Dough:
- 1 1/2 cups milk
- 1 cup warm water (between 110–115 degrees)
- 5 teaspoons active dry yeast
- 3 eggs
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup raisins
- 9 cups all-purpose flour + more for kneading
- 2 tablespoons milk
Filling:
- 1 cup sugar
- 3 tablespoons ground cinnamon
- 2 tablespoons butter, melted (approx.)
- 3 9×5 inch loaf pans
Instructions
- Warm milk (in the microwave or stovetop) to a luke-warm temperature (120-125 degrees F).
- Dissolve yeast in warm water and set aside until yeast is frothy, about 10 minutes or so.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer (or a large bowl) add in eggs, sugar, butter salt and raisins. Next, add room temperature/warm milk. Mix slowly to combine. Add water/yeast mixture. Mix slowly to combine.
- Add the flour gradually to make a dough.
- On a lightly floured surface, knead the dough for a few minutes until smooth. I usually finish my dough on the counter since my stand mixer is not a huge one and it tends to overfill. Depending on the time of the year, my dough might need closer to 9 cups. For this reason, I add 8 cups to the bowl and slowly add as I need it while kneading the dough.
- Place dough in a large, buttered, mixing bowl and turn to grease the surface of the dough.
- Cover with a warm, damp cloth and let rise. I usually turn my oven on for a couple of minutes while I am mixing the ingredients, turn oven off and let my dough rise in there. It’s warm enough but not hot that it will cook it.
- Allow to rise until doubled, usually about 1 1/2 hours.
- Roll out on a lightly floured surface into a large rectangle 1/2 inch thick.
- Moisten the dough with 2 tablespoons milk and rub all over the dough with your hands.
- Mix together 1 cup of sugar and 3 tablespoons cinnamon and sprinkle mixture evenly on top of the moistened dough.
- Roll up tightly (the long way). The roll should be about 3 inches in diameter.
- Cut into thirds, and tuck under ends and pinch bottom together.
- Place loaves into 3 well greased 9 x 5 inch pans and lightly grease tops of loaves with the melted butter.
- Let rise in warm place, uncovered, again for about an hour.
- Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until loaves are lightly browned and sound hollow when tapped.
- Remove from oven and let cool on rack. Take melted butter and spread over tops of loaves (totally optional).
- After about 20 minutes, lay loaves on their sides and remove from pans. Allow loaves to cool before slicing.
- I bake all 3 loaves at once, cool and slice. I freeze 2 of them for later use.
Notes
Whole wheat option: no more than 3 cups of all purpose flour can be swapped for whole wheat without getting a more dense loaf.
Don’t have 3 9×5 pans? you can use a 9-inch round pan and make a rounded bread too. Make sure it rises in that pan.
Both active dry yeast and rapid rise yeast will work for this recipe.
Like with any bread loaf, they should not be sliced until you are ready to eat them. UNLESS, you are slicing to freeze. They should be stored whole in an airtight bag.
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This sounds great!
I would love to make it but do not have three tins available, i don’t want to make a big round one as it’s probably not as easy to slice and freeze so i was wondering if i could bake this in batches? If after the two provings the loaves stay in the fridge while the other one is cooking will it be ok? What would you advice?
Many thanks!
yes, you can cook this in separate batches or freeze (see freezing directions). enjoy!
I have been trying recipes for Cinnamon Raisin bread. This one is my least favorite. For one thing, it needs more salt. The first rising was good but I was disappointed in the second rising. Will not use this recipe again.
★
Sorry this recipe did not work for your needs.
Seems I’m late to the party with making this bread! But…. it’s absolutely delish! Followed the recipe exactly however I definitely didn’t need to use 9 cups of flour (much to the disappointment of my 2.5 year old pouring helper!). Think it was more like 7 for us but still got 3 good size loaves out of it. Didn’t manage to wait for them to cool completely before diving in and eating some!
Definitely keeping the recipe and making again soon! Thanks xo
★★★★★
I’m so glad this was a success for you!
Nice recipe, just put it in the oven.
Tried this recipe today and it turned out awesome! It made the house smell heavenly. We’ve already devoured one loaf! lol We love raisins in our house so the next time I make this I’ll add a few extra! Thanks for sharing!
★★★★★
I’m so glad your family loved it!
Your instructions for freezing are only after all 3 have been baked. Can I just bake 1 bread and freeze the other 2, unbaked? If so, when should I do the freezing, before or after the first rise?
you can freeze the two other unbaked doughs after the first full rise similar to how you’d freeze pizza dough. I Hope this helps.
Can you use soy milk or almond milk or should it be cows milk? This bread sounds so yummy I can’t wait to try it out.
I’ve made it with almond milk and it’s worked out great. It isn’t as fluffy as the milk proteins do add some of the texture but still yields a terrific loaf. Enjoy!
I made this recipe today and my family love it, it came out just like in the picture, thanks so much for sharing it with us, definitely I will continue making it for my family and friends.
★★★★★
I’m so glad you loved it!
My search for a no knead cinnamon raisin bread recipe is over! Your recipe is wonderful, and that it makes three large, beautiful and tasty loaves is a bonus :-), Two for the freezer and one in the cupboard. Thank you so much for this recipe!
★★★★★
I’ve had this recipe bookmarked for what feels like forever. I finally today made it and I’m so in love with it I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to make it. It was easy to make and is absolutely perfect. I did make two tiny changes, one was using instant yeast instead of active dry. It’s my preferred yeast method and drastically cuts down on the recipe time (instead of the first hour and half long rise, you let the dough rest for 10 minutes and then roll and shape as usual). My other little tweak was doubling the raisins because I’m a raisin fanatic. This resulted in 3 perfect quick loaves! I don’t know if you’ll see this review since the recipe is an older one but I just wanted to say THANK YOU for sharing!!!
★★★★★
I am so glad this recipe was such a winner for you! It is definitely a winner at my house and you just gave me the reminder I needed to bring it back to life and make it again!
Perfect for breakfast. Pretty sure my family’s going to love this! Thanks for sharing!
★★★★★
Is there any way to reduce it to half of this recipe without jeopardizing the outcome.. not sure I have a bowl large enough for 8 cups of flour. Thank you
I often do half the recipe in two batches. then mix both doughs on the counter and divide into three. I do not have measurements for a single loaf. sorry!