Cinnamon Rolls With Honey Glaze
Aug 14, 2014, Updated Jan 02, 2018
Soft and fluffy homemade cinnamon rolls topped with a warm honey glaze.
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I think I am falling in love with yeast, no seriously I always thought I enjoyed baking cakes and cookies more than anything else but these days I am always looking for ways to play around with the yeast. From being terrified of yeast to falling in love, it has indeed been quite a journey. Working with yeast is just so much fun, it really is! From breads to buns to pretzels to rolls, yeast is what turns an ordinary dough into all these lip-smacking yuminess! I have worked with yeast to make some beautiful breads/buns in the past and these cinnamon rolls are the latest addition to the ever growing list!
Cinnamon is one of my favorite spices, a little bit of cinnamon in any muffin/cake/drink makes it smell and taste amazing and I never miss an opportunity to use it like here in my Blueberry Muffins or here in Raisin Cinnamon Bread. So when I discovered Cinnamon rolls for the first time, I was obviously quite excited, I mean soft cinnamon rolls drizzled with a sweet glaze, what can possibly go wrong there? And so I had my first cinnamon roll at Cinnabon and trust me it exceeded my expectations. The rolls were just so GOOD and I knew at that very moment that I have to make these at home someday!
And so today was the day when I made these rolls and I was super pleased with the result. These rolls were soft, light, fluffy and exactly what you look for in a good cinnamon roll. Are cinnamon rolls time-consuming? YES. Are they worth it? YES YES YES! I will not lie, these rolls take time and that’s how they have been made traditionally but once you dig into warm and soft cinnamon rolls straight out of the oven, it all feels worth it. Have patience, plenty of it if you want to make these rolls at home. So what exactly is the easy part about these rolls? It is the dough. Not only is it easy to make, it’s also very easy to work with. It’s smooth, soft and you don’t have to worry a lot while rolling it.
To make the dough, I used all purpose flour, egg, salt, milk, water, sugar and yeast. I used whole milk and recommend using the same, somehow the texture of these rolls isn’t the same with fat free milk in my opinion. Like I always always mention use a good quality yeast, it makes all the difference. I use red star active dry yeast and it works well for me. Making the dough is easy especially if you own a Kitchen-aid stand mixer but no worries in case you don’t. Stir everything together using a wooden spoon and then knead with your hands till it’s soft and smooth.
For the filling make sure the butter is really soft else it will be difficult to spread it and yes use unsalted butter, you don’t want salty cinnamon rolls! When you make cinnamon rolls you need to make a glaze, you cannot serve these rolls without a glaze. I made a simple honey glaze and it tasted great with the rolls. Make sure to pour the drizzle all over the rolls and serve immediately. Cinnamon rolls taste best the day they are made and you must eat them warm!
Method
Start by mixing together flour and salt in a bowl. Set aside.
In another bowl take warm water, which should be around 115 F degrees, add 1 teaspoon of sugar and yeast to it. Let it stand for 5 minutes.
Meanwhile in the stand mixer or using a wooden spoon mix together melted butter, egg, sugar and milk.
After 5 minutes the yeast will get activated and you will see it all bubbling up, in case you don’t it means your yeast is dead. Throw away the water and start over again.
Add the yeast mixture to the the egg-milk-butter mixture and mix till well combined.
Start adding the flour in parts, add 1/2 of it first and run the mixer on low speed till it’s all incorporated.
Using a spatula scrap down the sides to mix in all the flour together.
Now add the remaining flour and mix at low speed.
Once it’s all mixed, increase the speed of mixer to medium [fitted with dough hook] and let it knead for 5-7 minutes or till the dough is totally smooth. Alternatively you can use your hands to knead the dough. It will take around 10 minutes if you use your hands.
Take a bowl and and coat it will canola or vegetable oil. Place the dough ball in the bowl and brush it with oil. Make sure the dough is coated with oil from all sides and top & bottom. Cover with a cling sheet and let it rise at a warm place for around 90 minutes. This time will vary according to how hot or cold the temperature is at your place. While I was making these rolls, it wasn’t very hot so this is what I did. I preheated my oven to 200 F degrees and then switched it off. I then placed my dough in the oven [which was off] and let it rise.
After 90 minutes, the dough as you can in the picture more than doubled in size.
Meanwhile in a bowl mix together cinnamon powder and granulated sugar. Set aside.
Remove the dough from the bowl and punch to release the air. Let it sit for 5 minutes.
Using a roller or your hands, roll the dough to a 13 x 8 inch rectangle. I used my hands and used my pan as a guide for measurement.
Take softened unsalted butter and spread it all over the dough.
Now sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar all over, making sure to cover the entire dough.
Starting from the long end, start rolling the dough tightly.
Roll till you have a log. You can use little water to seal the edges towards the end.
Cut the dough into 10 pieces. I cut the end portion from both side and them cut the remaining log into 10 parts.
Brush a 13 X 9 inch pan with oil or butter and arrange the cinnamon rolls in it, leaving a little space between each roll. Cover with a cling sheet and let it rise for around 45 minutes or till they are all puffed up.
Preheat oven to 350 F degrees.
After 45 minutes, this is how my cinnamon rolls looked like – all puffed up, beautiful and ready to be baked!
Bake at 350 F degrees for 25-30 minutes or till nice golden brown in color. Mine were done in 25 minutes.
While the rolls are in the oven make the glaze – in the stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or using your hand mixer, beat together melted butter, vanilla, powdered sugar and heavy cream. Once it’s all smooth, add in the honey and give it a final mix.
Pour the honey glaze over the warm cinnamon rolls and dig right in!
* Use whole milk in this recipe, I do not recommend using skim milk for cinnamon rolls.
* Cinnamon rolls minus the glaze can be frozen for up to 2 months.
* The dough should be soft, if you feel it isn’t add little extra milk.
Cinnamon Rolls With Honey Glaze
Ingredients
Dough
- 2.5 cups + 2-3 tablespoons all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2.25 teaspoons active dry yeast
- ¼ cup + 3 tablespoons whole milk
- ¼ cup + 2 tablespoons warm water [~ 115 f degrees]
- 1 egg
- 3 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon granulated sugar [1 tsp is to be added in the yeast mixture]
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter melted
Filling
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter softened
- ¼ cup + 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon powder
Glaze
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter melted
- 2-3 tablespoons heavy cream
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons honey
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
Dough
- Start by mixing together flour and salt in a bowl. Set aside.
- In another bowl take warm water, which should be around 115 F degrees, add 1 teaspoon of sugar and yeast to it. Let it stand for 5 minutes.
- Meanwhile in the stand mixer or using a wooden spoon mix together melted butter, sugar, egg and milk.
- After 5 minutes the yeast will get activated and you will see it all bubbling up.
- Add the yeast mixture to the the egg-milk-butter mixture and mix till well combined.
- Start adding the flour in parts, add 1/2 of it first and run the mixer on low speed till it's all incorporated.
- Using a spatula scrap down the sides to mix in all the flour together.
- Now add the remaining flour and mix at low speed.
- Once it's all mixed, increase the speed to medium [fitted with dough hook] and let it knead for 5-7 minutes or till the dough is totally smooth. Alternatively you can use your hands to knead the dough.
- Take a bowl and and coat it will canola or vegetable oil. Place the dough ball in the bowl and brush it with oil. Make sure the dough is coated with oil from all sides, top & bottom.
- Cover with a cling sheet and let it rise at a warm place for around 90 minutes to up to 2 hours.
- Meanwhile in a bowl mix together cinnamon powder and sugar. Set aside.
- After 90 minutes, the dough will more than double in size.
Filling
- Remove the dough from the bowl and punch to release the air. Let it sit for 5 minutes.
- Using a roller or your hands, roll the dough to a 13 x 8 inch rectangle. I used my hands and used by pan as a guide for measurement.
- Take softened unsalted butter and spread it all over the dough.
- Now sprinkle the cinnamon-sugar all over, making sure you cover the entire dough.
- Starting from the long end, start rolling the dough tightly.
- Roll till you have a log. You can use little water to seal the edges towards the end.
- Cut the dough into 10 pieces.
- Brush a 13 X 9 inch pan with oil or butter and arrange the cinnamon rolls in it, leaving a little space between each roll.
- Cover with a cling sheet and let it rise for around 45 minutes or till they are all puffed up.
- Preheat oven to 350 F degrees.
- After 45 minutes, the cinnamon rolls will be all puffed up, beautiful and ready to be baked.
- Bake at 350 F degrees for 25-30 minutes or till nice golden brown in color.
Glaze
- While the rolls are in the oven make the glaze - in the stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment or using your hand mixer, beat together melted butter, vanilla, powdered sugar and heavy cream.
- Once it's all smooth, add in the honey and give it a final mix.
- Pour the honey glaze over the warm cinnamon rolls and dig right in!
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Hey, please post an eggless version of this ……thanks !!
Love all your recipes… Stay safe 💖
Anubha
I will try! 🙂
This recipe is a great inspiration but i kind of tweaked it a little. I added nutmeg, ginger, all spice and cardamom. I also used 250 g of flour and 150g of water with a tsp of yeast , a tablespoon of sugar, and a pinch of salt. Then after i kneaded the dough and gave it 45 minutes to rise i rolled it out , spread butter on top and rolled it in the cinamon sugar solution and then baked it. Now i enjoy an apartment that smells like cinammon and hot cinnamin rolls.
Thank you, Manali! It turned out awesome, my kids loved it like anything. Much love??
Hi Manali, I have tried this recently. The dough becomes very soft and it was very difficult to roll it . So I have to added extra flour after the first rise. Can you tell me where did I make mistake? I used my Electronic hand mixture for mixing the flour to the egg mixture
This is a soft dough but you will should be able to roll it. I typically just use my hands to spread the dough. Sprinkle some flour and then try, should be okay.
Can these be made eggless also
I have not tried Nidhi…will try and post eggless version
They came out perfect. Thanks
glad to know!
You dont mention how much water is to be used to activate the yeast…
It is mentioned in the recipe , check the printable recipe at the end! 🙂
Thanks Pamela!