In 8th grade, my best friend from middle school moved to Australia because of her father’s job. Their family left in December, partway through our school year, because that was Australian children’s summer vacation, so my friend and her little sister could enroll in classes along with everyone else their age when schools opened their doors again at the end of January.
My parents quickly recognized how much I missed my best friend, so for Valentine’s Day, they surprised me with a plane ticket to Sydney during my Spring Break. It would be the longest trip I had ever made by myself—a full 14-hour flight!—and I started counting down the days on my calendar until the departure date.
The day after I arrived in Australia, my friend’s mom offered to schedule a low-key day in Sydney and around their house to give me time to adjust from the jet lag. Since I rarely sleep well on planes, I gratefully agreed, and she planned to drive us around the city in the afternoon to check out the Harbour Bridge, Opera House, and Luna Park.
But before we left on our sightseeing tour, her mom pulled out a thick cookbook from in the kitchen, flipped through a few pages, and let it fall open on a cinnamon roll recipe. I had never made cinnamon rolls from scratch before—all of the freshly baked ones in my house had come from a can!—so we took turns measuring ingredients, kneading the dough, and sprinkling cinnamon sugar across the top.
Although those cinnamon rolls turned out better than any I had tasted, including the gourmet ones from Cinnabon, at least five years passed before I tried baking a batch again on my own. As a teenager, I lacked the patience to wait for them to rise and bake… I wanted to eat them two hours ago when I pulled out the mixing bowls!
But fast forward to the present day, and I find baking cinnamon rolls to be incredibly peaceful and rewarding. The methodical kneading, rolling, sprinkling, sealing, arranging, waiting… And that magical moment when you pull the towel off of the top of the pan to see the rolls tall and airy and competing for space with their neighbors after they’ve risen… That’s pure, innocent joy.
And the recipe for these Clean Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls is my new favorite! That warm pumpkin flavor, those cozy swirls of sticky cinnamon sugar, and the airy dough holding it all together is the equation for fall bliss. The entire pan never stood a chance around my family!
Let’s start with the dough. It’s a yeast dough, but don’t let that scare you off! Yeast is very easy to work with, and it’s simply the ingredient used to create air bubbles to make the rolls rise. Baking powder and baking soda react with acid to make pockets of air, whereas yeast reacts with warm liquid and sweetener to do the same thing. That’s all there is to it!
So to start, you’ll mix that yeast with warm milk, melted butter, salt, and coconut sugar. Coconut sugar is a clean eating friendly solid sweetener, but it doesn’t taste like coconut at all! It has a similar taste to dark brown sugar, that rich subtly caramel-like flavor, but it pours like granulated sugar. You can find it on the baking aisle of most grocery stores, and this is the kind I usually buy.
After a few minutes of letting the yeast get acclimated, you’ll add the pumpkin purée. Remember to use plain ol’ pumpkin purée, not pumpkin pie filling! The latter contains refined sugar, which we’re trying to avoid in this healthier cinnamon roll recipe. And of course, you can’t have pumpkin without cinnamon, so you’ll add a generous amount of that to the dough too!
Once you’ve mixed in the white whole wheat flour, it’s time to knead. Here is my video on how to properly knead dough for cinnamon rolls. (Scroll down to above the recipe!) I always knead by hand because it feels really soothing and therapeutic, and it only takes a few minutes. The dough is done when you can press your index finger into it, and it springs back most of the way.
Then roll out the dough into a big rectangle, brush it with melted butter, and sprinkle with your cinnamon sugar. I like to gently pat down the cinnamon sugar with my palms so it stays in place better while rolling up the dough and pinching the seam to seal. Then watch that same cinnamon roll video to see my secret trick on how to slice the rolls!
I know it sounds strange, but my favorite part of the process is seeing the cinnamon rolls after they’ve risen, just before popping them in the oven. It’s magical how they’ve doubled in size and barely fit in the pan after just 30 minutes of sitting! But of course…
Eating them warm and fresh from the oven is my next favorite part!
| Clean Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls | | Print |
- for the dough
- 3 tbsp (45mL) warm nonfat milk (about 100-110°F)
- ½ tbsp (7g) unsalted butter, melted
- 3 tbsp (36g) coconut sugar
- ½ tsp salt
- 2 ¼ tsp (one ¼-oz package) active dry yeast
- ¾ cup (183g) pumpkin purée
- 1 tbsp (8g) ground cinnamon
- 2 – 2 ½ cups (240-300g) white whole wheat flour
- for the filling
- 6 tbsp (72g) coconut sugar
- 2 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tbsp (7g) unsalted butter, melted
- Lightly coat a 9”-round cake pan or springform pan with nonstick cooking spray. Set aside.
- To prepare the dough, stir together the milk, butter, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. Sprinkle the yeast on top, and wait 10-15 minutes or until the mixture turns frothy. Stir in the pumpkin purée and cinnamon. Mix in 1 ½ cups of flour. If the dough is still wet, continue stirring in flour 2 tablespoons at a time until the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
- Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface, and knead for 3-5 minutes or until the dough springs back most of the way when you gently press your index finger into it. Let the dough rest while preparing the filling.
- To prepare the filling, stir together the coconut sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl.
- On a clean, well-floured surface, roll the dough out into a 16x10” rectangle. Brush with the melted butter, leaving a 1” border on the two longer sides. Sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar, leaving a 1” border on the two longer sides again. Carefully roll up the dough into a log, starting at one long edge and rolling towards the other one. Pinch the ends to seal. If the dough won’t stick together, gently brush the second longer edge with water before pinching to seal.
- Slice the log into 12 pieces using dental floss or a sharp serrated knife. Place the rolls into the prepared pan, and cover the pan with a clean towel. Set the pan in a warm, draft-free spot, and let the rolls rise for 30-45 minutes or until doubled in size.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Bake the cinnamon rolls for 18-22 minutes or until the filling is bubbling and the sides feel firm. Cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes before serving.
For the yeast, I used Red Star® Quick Rise Yeast. It performs the best out of any yeast I’ve used, so I highly recommend it!
Brown sugar may be substituted in place of the coconut sugar, but the rolls will no longer be clean-eating friendly.
For more tips on kneading the dough and slicing the cinnamon rolls, watch my video here located above the recipe.
{vegan, clean eating, low fat, low calorie}
Hi,
I am a clean eating cooking newbie. I do not whole wheat flour at home but I do have gluten free flour with xhanthem gum, would it be an even swap?
Please let me know.
Thank you,
Veronica
I really appreciate your interest in my recipe Veronica! I haven’t had good luck with gluten-free flours in my yeast-based recipes, so I don’t recommend that swap. They can be rather finicky since yeast-based recipes generally depend on the gluten for the bread or rolls to both rise and hold their shape. I hope you’re able to find whole wheat flour soon, and otherwise, regular all-purpose flour, white whole wheat flour, or whole wheat pastry flour would all be fine. 🙂 I can’t wait to hear what you think of these cinnamon rolls!
I’m so impressed. My expectations for these were to be honest, pretty low. They don’t photograph beautifully because of the whole wheat flour- but in practice they were amazingly pillow-soft and stood out among unhealthy recipes I’ve baked before. I thought my awesome kitchen experimenting days were behind me when I became healthier but these’ve totally changed my tune. I made them with almond butter in place of the butter, almond milk, 1 tablespoon of molasses for the yeast proofing, and 1/2 a banana for sweeteness and only a 1/2 cup of pumpkin. I used no coconut sugar and made my own filling with pumpkin purée and apple butter. They were awesome. Good job!!
I’m so glad you enjoyed these cinnamon rolls Emma! That means a lot to me that they exceeded your expectations. That’s the best kind of compliment! 🙂 Thank you for sharing your recipe modifications — I always love hearing what tweaks work!
These are delicious! I’m pretty sure I killed my yeast by heating the milk too high, so mine didn’t rise or spread much and came out teeny tiny and dense, BUT they still taste bomb! I will definitely be making these again (and being more careful with my milk) and have already shared the recipe with my sister telling her to try. My subs were 2% milk, salted butter (and halved the salt), light brown sugar, and regular whole wheat flour as these were what I had on hand. Also only needed about 1.5 cups of flour, so mine came out to ~100 calories per roll. Love it!
I’m so glad you enjoyed these cinnamon rolls Rachel! That means so much to me that you’ve already shared the recipe with your sister and you want to make them again. That’s the best kind of compliment — thank you!! 🙂