The Best Cinnamon Swirl Bread Recipe: Easy Sourdough + Whole Grain

Cinnamon is one of those COZY smells that make me excited for winter and all things warm. And this delicious, fragrant sourdough cinnamon swirl bread is just the right amount of sweet, fluffy, and pretty. Melty brown sugar caramelized with slightly-salty butter, and fragrant cinnamon, all beautifully rolled up in a half-whole-wheat and half-white, tangy sourdough bread.

It’s perfect for:

• a little treat to accompany an afternoon tea or coffee
• to-die-for French Toast
• a quick breakfast
• a gift for family or friends
• keeping in the freezer for an easy entertainment treat

I’ve made and given away countless loaves of this bread, and it always gets rave reviews from recipients. It balances the perfect line of being a sweet treat, while also filling and wholesome enough to actually eat as part of a (or a whole!!) meal. And the tang of sourdough is just the right balancing of flavors. It never, ever lasts long at my house!

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What is Cinnamon Swirl Bread?

Cinnamon Swirl Bread is a basic bread dough rolled out flat, spread with butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon, and then rolled into a log and baked in a loaf pan. The result is a beautiful, swirled ribbon of cinnamon deliciousness when the bread is cut and served.

There are a lot of variations out there. Some people use a batter in place of dough (which results in less of a uniform swirl), and many recipes use quick rising, commercially produced yeast (which make the process faster, but also very much not sourdough!). And a lot of people like to put raisins in their Cinnamon Swirl Bread.

Personally, I love using my basic sourdough recipe as the dough because I’m a big fan of tangy-sweet or salty-sweet combinations. And I also utilize half whole wheat flour in my basic sourdough recipe because it adds a bit more heartiness, texture, and nutritional value to the finished product. And the vast majority of the rise time for this recipe can happen overnight. So it doesn’t disrupt my schedule to utilize a sourdough recipe.

What do you need?

This recipe doesn’t require anything special, which makes it easily accessible for everyone to make. If you have the ingredients, a mixing bowl, a wooden spoon, a counter, some loaf pans, and a rolling pin, you’ve got everything you need! No stand mixer or proofing basket or dutch oven needed.

The ingredients are pretty basic as well. Which means you may have everything you need already in your pantry and fridge right now:

• sourdough dough (flour, water, salt, and sourdough starter)
• butter (or coconut oil)
• brown sugar (or white sugar with some molasses added)
• cinnamon

How did I start making Sourdough Cinnamon Swirl Bread?

My interest in baking began in middle school. I’m pretty sure I asked my Mom for a subscription to a cooking and baking magazine for Christmas when I was eleven. Each month, when the magazine came, I would sit on the couch and look through all the recipes, admiring the pictures and making a mental list of things I’d like to try. My favorite part of the recipes was the notes from the person who submitted the recipe about where it came from. Sometimes it was a family recipe, sometimes it was a neighbor’s or friend’s recipe, and sometimes it was a recipe the submitter had created.

One of the recipes I discovered in the magazine and immediately wanted to make was Cinnamon Swirl Bread. My mom would make cinnamon rolls a few times a year for special occasions. But I thought the idea of cinnamon bread would be easier to learn, and possibly healthier than cinnamon rolls. My mom – ever patient with my baking endeavors! – let me try my hand at Cinnamon Swirl Bread and we were hooked!

As an adult, I’ve switched to making sourdough bread. I adapted my basic, simple sourdough recipe to use as the dough for Cinnamon Swirl Bread. And now my own family is hooked as well (in fact, my girls love to help out with the process)!.

Variations You Could Try:

I’ve made this Sourdough Cinnamon Swirl Bread dairy free before with great results. You can substitute the butter for an equal amount of coconut oil with just a pinch of salt added.

You could also add raisins for additional sweetness and texture, and some iron content along with it!

I think this would also be tasty with some chopped walnuts or pecans sprinkled over the brown sugar and cinnamon mixture. It would add a different depth of flavor and a bit of a crunchy texture too.

And lastly, although I haven’t personally tried them, you could mix up some of the flavors a little. One idea would be to add a Tbsp of vanilla to the bread dough if you wanted to give it a little bit of a hint of vanilla. Another idea is to add some cardamom or nutmeg or ginger (or any combination!) to the cinnamon. Or you could mix some wild orange essential oil into the butter and add cloves to the cinnamon for a citrus, holiday flare.

Steps You’ll Take (and Timelines):

Between 7pm-10pm the night before baking:

First, you’ll mix up some sourdough starter into sourdough bread dough. Place some active sourdough starter into a large mixing bowl with a lid, and add water, salt, and whole wheat flour. Mix with a wooden spoon. Just as a note, I don’t spoon and level my flour for making the dough, I just dip my measuring cup into the flour bin and scoop it out!

Second, you’ll switch to hand-mixing/kneading (I just do this in the mixing bowl so I don’t have to do any additional clean up!) once the wooden spoon is too difficult to use, and you’ll add a bit more flour. For this step, I use all purpose flour.

Third, you’ll cover the mixing bowl with the lid and let it rise overnight.

In the morning, 2-3 hours before you want to bake, finish the dough:

The dough should have risen and at least doubled by this point, with a nice, bubbly texture.

First, you’ll prepare two loaf pans by lining them with baking paper. You could also grease them if that is easier, but I find the baking paper to be particularly easy.

Second, stretch the risen dough to activate the gluten and help the dough have structure. I do this by getting my hands wet with water, running my fingers down the inside of the mixing bowl together, and then grabbing a handful of dough and pulling it up for 8-10 inches before folding it over on itself into the middle of the bowl. I repeat this step 4-6 times as I work my way around the bowl. Usually the amount the dough can stretch decreases as I go along.

Third, once the dough is stretched and it is back to more of a firm, dough shape, sprinkle your countertop with flour. Turn the dough out onto the counter top and divide into two equal halves. Each half with make one loaf of bread.

Then assemble the dough into the swirl bread:

Fourth, roll out the dough (starting with one of the halves, and then doing the other for each step, but you could also do them one at a time if you don’t have enough counter space) to about 8 inches by 15-20 inches. The greater the length is, the more swirl you will have in your bread, so feel free to adjust as you like. The width should be about the length of your loaf pan, as it will be the width of your bread log.

Fifth, spread butter on top of the dough. Sprinkle with just a touch of flour (I like to add a little flour to the layers of butter-brown sugar-and-cinnamon so the mixture thickens a bit as it cooks and doesn’t all run out the end of the loaf).

Sixth, sprinkle the butter with brown sugar – or spread heavily if you prefer! Sprinkle a tiny bit of flour over the brown sugar.

Seventh, sprinkle the cinnamon over the brown sugar. And again, sprinkle with flour.

Eighth, roll up the dough into a log, starting with the smaller (8-inch wide) end. I try to roll tightly but without over stretching the dough.

Then, allow the dough to rise once it is in the bread loaf form:

Ninth, place the dough log into the prepared loaf pan. Place the loaf pan with the dough log in it inside a large zip-top bag, and then blow some air into the bag to inflate it like a balloon.

Tenth, leave the bags with the dough in it someplace warm – I like to find a sunny spot on the table or a window sill. It should rise until it is a nice, dough-shape, doming up above the loaf pan. On warm, sunny summer days, this takes about an hour for me, but on cooler, wintery days in a cooler house, this may take 2-3 hours. It’ll depend on your house temperature and the activity of your starter. Once the dough is risen to the desired height, preheat the oven on 200 C fan-forced (about 390 F convection).

Lastly, bake and store the loaves:

Finally, remove the loaf pans from the plastic bags and place the pans into the preheated oven. Bake for about 30-35 minutes or until the bread is nice and golden on top.

Allow it to cool on a cooling rack (once I’ve taken it out of the oven, I wait 15-20 minutes then lift the baking paper with the bread in it out of the pan and set it on a cooling rack to finish cooling).

Slice it to the desired thickness and enjoy with butter or however you think it will be tasty!

You can wrap the bread in plastic or place it in a large, zip-top bag and freeze it if desired. I would guess it’ll freeze well for up to 3 months if it is wrapped well. Personally, it always gets eaten at my house before it lasts that long!

You could also store it in the fridge for 5-7 days. Since there are no preservatives in the bread, I wouldn’t recommend leaving it at room temperature for more than about 24 hours.

Let me know in the comments below if you’ve tried this recipe and how it turned out for you!