Cinnamon Buns and Challah

I must be insane to bake for hours on a warm summer's day. The house has no air conditioning and the ventilation leaves much to be desired. Thus, it's been a sweaty evening. But... I did make cinnamon buns and challah tonight. They look pretty good, but I have yet to take a taste test.

The cinnamon buns:



And the challah:















After all of that, I hope it tastes ok. I don't particularly like the icing recipe I used. It's simply sweet and not much else. I know that sweet is the point, but this is just sugar and the added vanilla and lemon doesn't temper or add to it. My proportions must be off.

The challah was a challenge, as always. The recipe I use turns out really well, but I'm convinced that the amount of flour required was a typo. I ended up adding another 6 oz. of flour to the recipe, just to make it kneadable. I'm getting the hang of handling dough, though, and I find myself enjoying things like kneading. Of course, I am a little spoiled by the stand mixer and its trusty dough hook.

I've been watching Barefoot Contessa and I would like to make three of Ina Garten's desserts. One is a chocolate angel food cake. I even went to Great News to buy a angel food cake pan today, only to find that today was the only day they closed early. The other dessert is a lime tart. Looks really easy and I love citrus tarts. The third is peanut butter swirl brownies. A reviewer on the Food Network site said she used Nutella along with the peanut butter, so I'm going to have to try that.