Crescent Rolls

My mom makes the best crescent rolls in the whole world. Probably the universe. They're amazingly delicious and buttery and fluffy. She (with the help of child labor, aka her kids) makes them two or three times a year, usually at Christmas, Easter, and Thanksgiving. It takes all afternoon; mixing the dough, letting it rise, and then realizing it hasn't risen enough so letting it rise again (which usually involves the dough rising up over the top of the bowl and occasionally spilling down the sides and onto the stove...). Then it has to be kneaded (insert corny jokes here) which is a nice release for anyone who carries frustrations at the point in time. Then the dough gets rolled out in a half-hearted attempt at a circle (with laments from certain people about how it shrinks) and then gets buttered and cut into... a lot of pieces. Sixteen? As many as looks good.

Of course, there are those miserable times when *someone* forgets to butter the dough before cutting, which then involves laughter-filled attempts to butter these little triangular imps which are constantly shrinking or tearing. These evil fiends then get rolled up from the big end to the point and placed on a cookie sheet and baked at some temperature that rivals the surface of the sun. Eons later (or so it seems as the smell of baking bread wafts across the house) the crescent rolls get taken out of the oven and get their tops dipped in butter. Then they're left to cool a bit (except for those poor rolls who are deemed "testers" and are devoured mercilessly mere second after being buttered) and then packaged up to be taken to Grandma and Grandpa's for whatever-holiday-it-is dinner.

Upon arriving, these rolls who survived the testing phase (and the snitching phases, and the "mom I'm hungry are we there yet can I eat a roll so I don't get sick" phase...) are placed in an *adorable* basket with a cute little bread cloth and displayed for all the world to see and try not to drool over while the rest of the meal takes the time of the Ice Age to prepare. After the rest of the meal is finally ready, these surviving rolls are doomed. Over. Done. Finito. Like, hasta lasagna, don't get any on ya. We never take leftovers home.

Anyway, all this to say that I didn't feel like making a zillion crescent rolls for little ole' me. So I went and *gasp* bought some generic Giant Eagle brand crescent rolls. You know the cardboard tube that's supposed to pop when you open it? That kind.

Well it should've been my first clue. The tube didn't pop. It didn't even make a noise. In fact, it didn't open. After beating it to death on the counter, I got it open. Out popped two rolls of dough. Ok, no problem right? Psht. In theory (and according to the directions) one should simply unroll the dough, split apart the pre-perforated triangles, roll them up and bake them. Voila!

It's a lie. The dough doesn't unroll. It was one big lump. Lacking a rolling pin, I took a less intelligent method and simply cut the roll of dough like cinnamon rolls. The dough, having been in my freezer for... a while, was hard and kind of hard to cut evenly. I guess they didn't turn out too bad for being some store-bought non-name brand piece of dough made with some fake butter that doesn't even taste real... ;-)