I know, I baked these over a week ago.  But they’ve been too delicious for breakfast since then for me NOT to tell you all about them.

I didn’t bake just ANY rolls….  These were the most fabulous Eat Live Run’s cardamom rolls:

I truly don’t know what’s gotten into me these days with the baking.  I’m in the midst of a lunch and dinner funk, yet give me some flour and some sugar and I’ll go to town, despite the fact that I have always hated baking.  HATED it.

I wonder if it’s because it’s so different to cooking, or because the half-marathon training brought back extra carby goodness to my life, or if the fact that I don’t tend to buy sweets here on a regular basis has finally worn me down, but I seem to be best friends with my oven lately.

I was also alone a couple of weekends ago, frustrated at not having all that much to do out of the house, and keeping very close company with my Mad Men DVD set.  When you start seeing a bit of Betty Draper in yourself, you can either get scared you’ll lose your mind… or bake.

I obviously chose the latter.

Now, I had to replace the whole milk with soy milk (and added a 1/2 tablespoon extra butter to make up for the missing milk creaminess), the regular yeast with instant (all I had), and the smoothly-ground  cardamom with picked-from-the-pod and very badly bashed cardamom…  But other than that, I stuck to the recipe and trusted in those who bake well to get me from point A (mess in the bowl and on my hands as I hand-kneaded the dough) to B (pastry heaven):

I had only made rolls once before, and they turned out slightly tougher than hockey pucks.  But these were just delicious!  I’m sure that, had I had a real mixer and regular yeast, they would have turned out even more tender; I know hand warmth and butter do not the best pastry make, but I’m still thrilled with the results.

And making such tasty rolls sure beats breaking chairs, shooting at things, and otherwise going bonkers a la Betty Draper.