How a 74-year-old restaurant makes the best cinnamon roll in Chicago

• We visited Ann Sather in Chicago to see how it makes its iconic cinnamon rolls.
• Made from milk, water, flour and topped with a vanilla glaze, Ann Sather's inexpensive cinnamon rolls are loved by the local community.
• Founded in 1945, Ann Sather ran the diner herself for 35 years before handing over the restaurant to her apprentice.

Following is a transcript of the video.

Medha Imam: Layers and layers of cinnamon rolled into a buttery dough, dripping with a sweet vanilla glaze. This is Ann Sather. And its cinnamon rolls have kept customers coming through its doors for almost 80 years.

Customer: Best thing on the menu has gotta be the cinnamon rolls. The best, ever.

Customers: These are absolutely excellent. These are delicious.

Medha: Ann Sather sells a bevy of breakfast items, but people in Chicago have been coming here for the cinnamon rolls since 1945. But with the rise of bakery giants, how has this mom-and-pop shop stood the test of time? Let's go inside and find out. Step into Ann Sather's and you instantly feel at home, surrounded by families, friends, and boatloads of comfort food.

Tom Tunney: Just right out of the oven. Oh, you had some, all right. You've already gotten. Oh, good. Good.

Medha: The colorful diner is filled with traditional Scandinavian art and, of course, the scent of its delectable cinnamon rolls.

Tom: How can no one not have an Ann Sather cinnamon roll, unless they're from out of town?

Medha: That's Tom Tunney, a Chicago native and current owner of Ann Sather Restaurants. Featured on "Rachael Ray" and Food Network, Ann Sather's gooey, made-from-scratch creations are served hot from the oven and drizzled with frosting that oozes onto customers' plates. On average, the team at Ann Sather prepares about 60 cinnamon rolls per tray and sells about 100 trays daily. That's 6,000 cinnamon rolls a day.

Tom: And you know what? I still eat them. OK, so you say, "Oh, you must be sick of them." I'm like, "No, no, no." As they come out of that oven, there's nothing better. Well, I'll go for a period and not eat them, and then all of a sudden I'll have four in a day. [laughs]

Medha: And there's a special ingredient behind the much-loved cinnamon rolls. Tom found out the secret recipe when he took over the restaurant from its namesake, Ann Sather.

In 1981, Ann Sather, the restaurant's founder, was looking for a successor who would continue serving homemade Swedish and Scandinavian recipes to the Lakeview community. At the time, Tom was a 24-year-old looking to own his own restaurant. The two hit it off, Ann sold the restaurant to Tom, and now Tom carries on her legacy.

For the last 35 years, Tom has kept his promise, learning every aspect of the trade, from cooking to cleaning tables to serving, all while letting Ann's spirit prevail by maintaining "good food, good friends, and good conversation."

Tom: Ann's was this oasis, they used to call it. It was a place where families could come, where you'd bring your children, and with the expansion of our restaurant into different parts of the city, it has really become a household name in the city of Chicago.

The cinnamon roll is a 75-year tradition of Ann Sather's. It's when we incorporated the cinnamon roll into the breakfast menu that it took off on wildfire.

Medha: According to Tom, the recipe behind the belly-warming Chicago breakfast staple took years to perfect.

Tom: The base of the cinnamon roll is a yeast product. So, what we have to do is, we have a dry mix that's made specifically for us that I cannot tell you the ingredients.

Medha: No, not at all?

Tom: No, it's a very complex little formula that's been in the Ann Sather family for probably 30 or 40 years.

Medha: The pillowy, soft rolls actually start off as that special dry mix, which is combined with lukewarm water and yeast.

Tom: The yeast product needs to rise and fall, rise and fall, and then it rolls out into this product, which is what makes it gooey and delicious.

Medha: And so, the ingredients that you can tell us?

Tom: Well, it's mostly flour, and it has wheat flour, it has soda. Actually, if you look in our Ann Sather cookbook, they'll have the ingredients.

Medha: All the ingredients. So you can make your cinnamon rolls at home.

Tom: I left one out just for the heck of it. So, this is ready to put into the pot. What will happen is, given the right amount of time and patience, this is going to double in size. So, I'm flattening the dough, and I am going to spread it so that I can put these great ingredients in it. Try to even it out, 'cause you want your cinnamon roll to look like it's uniform. First step is the margarine, soft margarine. Obviously, you don't wanna put too much, 'cause then it'll get too sloppy, as far as I'm concerned.

All right. So, next step is the cinnamon, pure cinnamon. Next is the mix of brown sugar and cinnamon. Maybe a little bit of white sugar should be in there too.

Medha: So, why did you add more cinnamon again?

Tom: Because the customers said, you know, they asked us. They said, you know, "It's a cinnamon roll. We don't taste the cinnamon." You know, the best thing to do in our business is listen to the customer. Especially when, around the country, in the '80s, there was many cinnamon-roll bakeries. Just bakeries for that, including an Ann Sather bakery concept of our own.

Medha: In fact, in the 1980s, cinnamon-roll shops began opening up across the country. Bakery giants like Cinnabon and TJ Cinnamons got their start in 1985. And in Chicago alone, there were already a dozen specialty cinnamon-roll shops. But even with all that competition, Ann Sather's cinnamon rolls not only survived, but thrived.

Ted Allen: The best thing you could ever eat when you roll right out of bed is a cinnamon roll from Ann Sather's in Chicago.

Customer: The cinnamon inside there, I don't know what they do to it, but it just is absolutely amazing. It just, it has to be a secret recipe.

Medha: To achieve the layers of cinnamon, Tom and his team roll the dough in a diagonal direction.

Tom: Obviously, it's called a cinnamon roll for a reason. OK? And we wanna make sure that we have somewhat of a uniform width here.

Medha: The addition of brown sugar and butter to the mix allows the pastry bun to become gooey and sticky after it's heated in the oven.

Tom: We're arranging them to be ready to be baked off. Try to space them out, 'cause they're gonna rise. This is a perfect cinnamon roll in the sense that there's enough rolls in the cinnamon roll, no pun intended.

Medha: Once in the oven, the rolls bake at 350 degrees for about 30 to 35 minutes.

Tom: It's about double the size of what you see on the original pan. Let's see what this one is doing.

Medha: Next up, the delectably sticky frosting.

Tom: For the glaze to glaze over, it's just coming fresh out of the oven. 'Cause that creates that drip that goes over the side of the rolls. If it's cold, it just sits on top of it. It doesn't have the glaze effect that you want.

The frosting, I think, is unique. I think what makes ours different is we use evaporated milk.

Customer: These cinnamon rolls are my favorite because they're not overwhelmingly sweet. This is a good balance. So you've got a nice blend of the cinnamon, the dough, and just a little bit of the frosting.

Customer: They're very warm, always fresh. I'm not sure I've been anywhere else that has cinnamon rolls at that size either. So that's pretty...always good. Hey, buddy.

Customer: Favorite thing about the cinnamon rolls, you get two of them. That has to be the best part of it. Double the trouble.

Tom: The best way to eat a cinnamon roll is, I'll say it in a negative, not with a fork. So pick it up, get your hands messy and your mouth messy, 'cause the frosting will go all over your face.

Medha: So, I just picked up this cinnamon roll, and you can see the craft of the cinnamon roll itself. Look at that winding circle of cinnamon. I'm just gonna go ahead and take a big bite. Tom said you shouldn't use a fork or knife, so just commit, commit to it.

Amazing. This is phenomenal. I feel like I've fulfilled a craving I've had for the past two years. I wanna say the frosting is probably the best part of this cinnamon roll. I know some may say other things, but I really enjoy the frosting. I think it perfectly complements the cinnamon roll, and it just is so different than other frostings I've had before.

If you're done with one, you don't have to wait for another. It's waiting for you right here. It's very fresh. It's soft, it's fluffy. And it has a tiny bit of a crunch on the outside, which is really nice.

Tom: This is the premier product, and this is what is our logo. This is what people come for. They come for the food, they take home cinnamon rolls, for sure.

Medha: Ann Sather is not only famous for its homemade cinnamon rolls, but also the wholesome and warm hospitality that reverberates throughout the restaurant.

Customer: The best thing about Ann Sather's, aside from cinnamon rolls, is just how much of a kind of community place this really is in the Lakeview neighborhood.

Tom: It's tradition. It's comfort food, it's comfort people. It's people that know your name and know your family, and it's very rewarding to see that.