Gooey, sticky, sweet, delicious frosted pumpkin cinnamon rolls – They are perfect for Fall!
Want one??? Or maybe an entire pan???!
Normally, homemade cinnamon rolls are so good on their own that there’s not really much you can do to make them even better… But stuffing the pastries with pumpkin and even more cinnamon somehow manages to do just that! Imagine a cinnamon roll filled with pumpkin pie.
Add a sticky, sugary glaze and you’re taking the cinnamon rolls to uncharted territory in deliciousness.
I made this particular batch of vegan pumpkin cinnamon rolls on Saturday when my friend Sara came to visit from Minnesota. (You’ll be hearing much more about Sara in the near future.)
Have you ever met someone for the first time and felt like you’ve known that person your entire life?
This is exactly how I felt when I met Sara two weeks ago…
We bonded over a shared love of photography, music, Saved by the Bell, and Freddie Prinze Jr. (Did you know he’s almost 40?!), talking non-stop the entire day about everything from awkward middle school dating experiences to our goals and dreams for the future.
We also spent quite a bit of time with the pumpkin cinnamon rolls.
Can you blame us?
Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp yeast
- 1 cup milk of choice
- 2 tbsp sweetener of choice (not xylitol or stevia)
- 2 1/2 cups whole-wheat pastry flour, spelt flour, or all-purpose flour, or a combination
- 2 tbsp baking powder
- 1/4 cup sugar of choice
- 1/8 tsp pure stevia extract, or 4 more tbsp granulated sugar of choice
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
- 4 tbsp melted coconut oil or full-fat (but trans-fat-free) butter-type spread
- 2 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 5 tbsp whole-wheat pastry or all-purpose flour
- 3 tbsp sugar of choice (I like Sucanat here)
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
- optional, 1/2 cup raisins
- scant 1 cup pumpkin puree
- dash salt
Instructions
Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls recipe: Warm the milk in a small measuring bowl. You want it warm, but not boiling: if you have a candy thermometer, it should read 110 degrees F. Stir in the 2 tbsp sweetener, sprinkle the yeast on top, and set aside for 5 minutes. During this time, it should bubble up. (If it does not bubble up, either your yeast is no good or your milk was too hot or cold.)
In a large measuring bowl, combine the 2 1/2 cups flour, baking powder, 1/4 cup sugar of choice, stevia, salt, the 2 tsp cinnamon, and 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice. Stir very well.
Stir the melted oil and vanilla extract into the milk mixture, then pour this into the large measuring bowl of dry ingredients and stir to form a dough. Especially if using spelt flour, you may need to add a little extra flour until it’s dry enough to form a dough. Form dough into a ball, then place in a lightly-greased large bowl. Cover loosely with a towel, and set in a warm place to rise 20 minutes or until doubled in size. (If your oven has a “bread proof” setting, this is the perfect place to let your pumpkin cinnamon rolls rise.)
Meanwhile, stir together all remaining pumpkin cinnamon roll ingredients (except the 5 tbsp flour) in a medium measuring bowl. Set aside. Lightly grease a 9×13 baking pan. Set aside.
After the dough has risen, punch dough to deflate. Knead dough with your hands, adding the 5 tbsp flour as you knead so that the dough is not sticking to your hands. Knead 5 minutes. On a lightly-floured surface, roll out the dough into a very thin rectangle. Spread the contents of the medium mixing bowl evenly on top. Carefully roll up the dough, lengthwise, lifting and rolling the dough.
Using a large, sharp knife, slice dough into 13 even rolls, wiping the knife after each cut. The filling may ooze out a bit, but this is okay. Place the rolls in the prepared baking pan, and return to the warm place for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. When it reaches this temperature, place cinnamon rolls in the oven and bake 20 minutes. Glaze with the recipe below:
For the Glaze:
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar or Sugar-Free Powdered Sugar
3 1/2 to 4 tsp milk of choice (or more or less to achieve desired glaze thickness)
Whisk ingredients together to form a glaze. Using a spoon, drizzle evenly over pumpkin cinnamon rolls.
Link Of The Day:
These were AWESOME!
Even my health food hating husband liked them :).
First thanks for sharing this. I keep trying your recipes but hardly post any comments. This time was different though! Because I really enjoyed making these rolls and I’d like to share my experience with others. First I think the dough needs a bit more sugar same as the filling. Also the amount of salt needs to be adjusted. The result was salty! My dough turned out perfect; fluffy and soft but salty! However after I frosted them they were not salty any more. Another thing is about filling. I’ll make more filing next time and won’t mix the raisin. instead I’ll spread the filling and sprinkle the raisin on top. It s a lot easier!
Thanks so much again for sharing this awesome recipe
Thanks for the comments by the way. I omitted the salt entirely and I didn’t mix in the walnuts, but sprinkled them over the dough covered in the filling mix before rolling. That worked well. 🙂 Thanks again, Sam
No I wouldn’t want any of these. Especially after seeing your hair dragging all over them in the picture! Yuck!
I am seriously thinking of ways to try and steal that cinnamon roll through my computer!! 😉 These look absolutely delicious!
Made these this weekend and they are Amazing! So scrummy and my unhealthy boyfriend even ate seconds… only thing to note is that using almond milk the yeast/milk step at the beginning didn’t appear to work as there weren’t that many bubbles so the dough was slightly denser but still absolutely delicious. Will be making again for the Christmas period :-).
I’m still kind of bummed that we spent so much time talking that we forgot to actually EAT the cinnamon rolls! What kind of girls are we?!?! <3 you!
Yum!!! Thanks for a healthy treat recipe!!! I made these tonight but made a few changes… I made the dough in my breadmaker, I put everything in in the order listed and just let it run through on the dough cycle. I also used 1/4 cup or so of date paste (date soaked in water then blended) as my sweetener in the filling. They turned out great!! I will certainly make again.
For the 2 tbsp. sweetener, do you recommend a liquid sweetener (ie. agave, maple syrup) or a sugar sweetener, such as sucant or coconut palm sugar?
Same for the 1/4 c. sugar of choice. Is there one in particular you recommend/don’t recommend?
Can’t wait to make ’em 🙂
For the 2 tbsp you can use either liquid or granulated. For the other, use granulated but not xylitol.
I made these last night while carving pumpkins. They turned our perfect! Thanks for this recipe!
These were great! I think I did something wrong though because they were much smaller than the ones in your pictures. Like I said though, they were delicious. I was so anxious for them to be ready, I even ate one raw! Thank you 🙂