Iceland at Home: Brauð & Co Cinnamon Rolls
As I settled in for a weekend of watching the French Open, my original plan was to finally tackle a baking project that’s been on my list since returning from France in 2024: Canelés de Bordeaux.
The copper molds I brought home from E. Dehillerin in Paris, the legendary cookware shop frequented by Julia Child, have been patiently waiting for their moment. And what better weekend to make a classic French pastry than during my favorite tennis major of the year? Then reality intervened.
Canelés are notoriously finicky. Beyond the batter itself, there’s a detailed mold preparation process that deserves more attention than I was prepared to give while trying to follow the action from Roland-Garros.
Instead, my thoughts drifted north to another memorable travel food experience. One that felt much more compatible with a weekend spent alternating between the kitchen and the television. A bakery in Reykjavík.
One of the things I love most about travel is how certain foods become tied to specific places and memories. Long after I forget details like flight numbers and hotel rooms, I can still remember particular meals, bakeries, and dishes that helped define a destination.
That’s always been part of the idea behind Tasted & Traveled. Travel may be what gets me on the plane, but food and the food culture are often what stay with me long after I return home.
With my next trip still about three months away, it feels like the perfect opportunity to spend some time exploring the “Tasted” side of the blog. Over the coming months, I’ll be recreating a few favorite discoveries from past travels, taking a couple of cooking and baking classes I’ve had my eye on, and sharing the results along the way.
The copper canelé molds from France will finally get their turn. There’s a laminated pastry class on the horizon, a pasta-making class already on the calendar, and knowing myself, probably a few unexpected culinary detours along the way.
First up: Iceland.
A Bakery Worth Seeking Out
If you’ve spent any time researching Reykjavík, you’ve probably come across Brauð & Co. The bakery is instantly recognizable thanks to its colorful, street-art-covered exterior, but what I remember most is what happened after I walked through the door.
The smell hit first: Fresh bread. Butter. Cinnamon. Cardamom.
The display case was filled with pastries, but the cinnamon rolls immediately caught my attention. Beautifully twisted, generously spiced, and somehow both rustic and refined, they quickly became one of my favorite food memories from Iceland. And no icing! The massive amounts of icing is the main reason why I steer away from American cinnamon rolls, and these had none of that! There’s also a distinct taste to the filling, likely influenced by the use of marzipan. An entire tube is ground and mixed into the cinnamon, which becomes part of the filling.
Like many visitors, I walked in expecting a good pastry. I walked out already thinking about when I might have another one. Braud became our go-to for pastries before heading out every morning during our time in Reykjavik.
Bringing Iceland Home
One of the great things about food is its ability to transport you. A smell, a flavor, or even the act of preparing a familiar recipe can instantly bring back memories of a place you’ve visited. I’ve found that some destinations stay with me through photographs. Others through stories, and some through recipes.
So with the French Open on television and Reykjavík on my mind, I decided it was time to see if I could recreate a little piece of Iceland in my own kitchen.
While the recipe suggests a stand-up mixer, I couldn’t be bothered to pull “the beast”, as I affectionately call my Pro Series KitchenAid, out of the cabinet. I carried on using my hand mixer with the dough hook attachment, and it seemed to work just fine. The dough came together easily enough, and before long the kitchen began to smell like a bakery.
One of the things I love about working with yeast dough is that it forces you to slow down. There are no shortcuts. Mix, knead, rest, shape, proof, and wait. Fortunately, that’s easier to do when you’ve got world-class tennis providing entertainment between each step.
And unlike canelés, cinnamon rolls are forgiving. If I slowed down while watching a point play out, the dough didn’t seem to mind.
The Result
The moment they came out of the oven, the kitchen filled with exactly the aromas I remembered from Brauð & Co. The first bite instantly brought me back to Reykjavík! To wandering the city streets, escaping the Icelandic weather for a warm bakery, and discovering one of those simple moments that unexpectedly becomes one of your favorite memories from a trip. These are airy and light! I am convinced that using 00 flour is part of this, as I have had the same result with 00 flour when making gnocchi.
Travel is often measured in miles, countries, and passport stamps. But sometimes it’s measured in flavors. Sometimes it’s a cinnamon roll from a small bakery in Iceland that stays with you years after you’ve returned home.
No recipe can perfectly recreate a travel experience, but that’s not really the point. I treat recipes as “suggestions,” but I followed this one, and it was worth all the nuances. I was also happy to take the time to figure out how to force the oven to 410F, which was the right conversion, rather than just wing it with the preset heat settings.
Looking Ahead
This won’t be the last stop on the culinary side of Tasted & Traveled. Over the next few months, I’ll be revisiting a few favorite destinations through food while also learning some new techniques along the way.
The French canelés are coming.
The pastry classes are coming.
The pasta-making adventure is coming.
And before long, it’ll be time to hit the road again. Until then, I’ll be keeping one foot in the kitchen and the other in my travel planning. Not a bad place to be.