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Glite Dictionary
🍩 A sweet pastry 😊 A kind person
cinnamon roll

cinnamon roll

8.1
A very kind, innocent person who seems unlikely to hurt others
  • noun
  • /ˈsɪnəˌmən roʊl/
  • Slang
translation icon : persona dulce
  • His genuine smile and caring nature makes him the cinnamon roll of our friend group.

Examples

  • I I thought I like s'more and then I listened to you say cinnamon roll and I was like, that's it, that's it.

  • Everyone knows her as a true cinnamon roll; she always goes out of her way to help others.

  • After hearing her heartfelt story, I realized she was a real cinnamon roll, so innocent and full of kindness.

Synonyms

sugar and spice
vscinnamon roll
  • Informal
1 3.5

Very nice and friendly in a sweet, gentle way

is more about innocent kindness and being unlikely to cause harm

Antonyms

meany
  • Offensive
5 7.2

A person who is unkind and hurts other people's feelings

How Kind

saint
308 3.9
cinnamon roll
  • Slang
8.1

Surface Forms

cinnamon roll singular
cinnamon rolls plural

Morphology

cinnamon + roll

The literal constituents ('cinnamon' spice + 'roll' pastry) point to a sweet baked good, and the slang meaning maps that sweetness/softness metaphorically onto a person's character. This metaphorical, culture-specific extension is partly inferable (sweet → kind) but not fully predictable or conventionalized for an average B1 learner without exposure, so it is only semi-transparent.

Etymology

Cinnamon roll One popular story says people began calling very kind, innocent people a cinnamon roll because the real cinnamon roll is soft, sweet, and easy to love; that cozy food image makes the phrase mean 'extremely kind or innocent'.