This week I reached out for a sticky, gooey, toasty cinnamon roll from the breakfast bar at Holiday Inn Express hotels.

You’ve probably seen the TV commercials, in which hard-nosed, tough-as-nails, eat-their-young business tigers become cuddly pussycats at the first sniff of their breakfast cinnamon rolls. Personally, when I look for a hotel, all I need is a clean bathroom with no hairs on the bar of soap, a Coke machine in the hallway and ESPN. But hot buns in the morning are a nice touch.

Here’s the blueprint: warm cinnamon rolls, pure and simple, with vanilla-cream icing.

Total calories: 410. Fat grams: 22. Dietary fiber: 2 grams. Manufacturer’s suggested retail price: free for hotel guests. Holiday Inn Express is a chain of basic, perfectly acceptable hotels that provide minimal extras but offer clean rooms and elevators that work.

Earlier this year, Holiday Inn Express decided to upgrade its complimentary “Express Start” breakfast bar. Out went those played-out baskets of dry banana-nut muffins that stick to the roof of your mouth, so when it’s time for your important sales meeting, all you can say is “mmphlglurgh smpphsh.”

These cinnamon buns are baked daily in one California bakery and shipped, frozen, overnight via UPS to all 1,300 Holiday Inn Express hotels coast to coast. This bakery makes 51,000 cinnamon rolls each day. I smell fresh buns … and serious overtime pay.

The cinnamon buns thaw overnight during delivery. Then they are popped into a specially created Holiday Inn cinnamon-bun warmer in the hotel lobby. When they reach 105 degrees — ding! — they’re ready. The buns are warmed during the 6:30-9:30 a.m. breakfast period. Of course, in places like Phoenix and Houston, the heating can be accomplished by leaving them outside for about 10 minutes.

The buns are 4 inches across and weigh 3 1/2 ounces. It took the Holiday Inn research-and-development team five years to devise the secret recipe. (Again, I smell some serious OT pay.) The buns are made with Grade AA cinnamon that is so expensive, the main supply is kept in a secret, closely guarded “undisclosed location,” known mysteriously as Area 75. Holiday Inn won’t disclose the ingredients, but you can bet there’s plenty of butter in there. The hotel chain recommends that you eat these buns with a fork. There’s a two-napkin minimum.

These cinnamon buns are, well, fabulous. They’re right up there with Cinnabons from the mall — except you don’t have to fill out a loan application to buy one.

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page B1.