Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

Bakerella posted the recipe for these pumpkin cinnamon rolls less than a month ago but it was pretty clear that these needed to be added to the pumpkin week agenda STAT.  Before seeing this recipe, I was going to try pumpkin doughnuts but CA voted for cinnamon rolls and it was a good decision all around.

I made a few modifications to the recipe to based on personal preference and to make it easier for me to have fresh cinnamon rolls at a fairly reasonable breakfast time.

The main change I made was to make the dough the day before and then let it rise in the refrigerator overnight.  This worked perfectly for me.

This dough recipe is excellent!  Flour, sugar, pumpkin pie spices, and salt are mixed together with butter, milk, yeast, egg and pumpkin puree.  All that gets to rise for a few hours (or overnight in my case)  It's pretty darn delicious.



I didn't actually have pumpkin pie spice mix but I found a recipe for it that says to substitute 3 parts cinnamon to 1 part each of nutmeg, allspice and ginger.  Because this recipe calls for 2 tsp of pumpkin pie spice I put in 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/3 tsp nutmeg, 1/3 tsp allspice and 1/3 tsp ginger.  It worked perfectly and I didn't have to buy yet another spice mix to put in my cupboard.  Another good decision.

I woke up in the morning to perfectly risen dough and get started on filling, rolling and baking...

The dough gets rolled out and filled with brown sugar, white sugar, pecans and cinnamon.  It's an amazing mixture and very classic cinnamon roll (if you like nuts in your cinnamon rolls which I'm firmly in favor of).

I cut back on the amount of butter and sugar in the filling.  This is a very unusual for me and it had nothing to do with me wanting them to be healthier (it's a cinnamon roll, it's supposed to be a sugar bomb!).  The reason I cut back was that I honestly couldn't find anywhere to put all that stuff.  The dough was so well coated with roughly half the amount that I just stopped.  I did however put all the nuts in there.  More good decisions.

All that goodness gets rolled up as tightly as possible inside the dough and sliced into individual portions.  I didn't do a great job rolling these very tightly, or slicing them, or lifting them from the counter into the pan without making a giant mess so my rolls weren't perfectly rolled by the time they made it to their final baking place. 

Who cares?  They were still beautiful and delicious and filled with sugar and nuts and cinnamon.

After getting the rolls settled, they rise for about 30 minutes before getting baked up (mine hardly rose at all, again, who cares?  It didn't affect the end product as far as I can tell).

My third and fourth recipe modifications came with the icing. 

The original recipe calls for maple flavoring which I don't have (and I'm not even sure what is it) so I substituted maple syrup.  It worked great.

Then I had a flash of brilliance and decided to add dark rum to the icing.  Best decision ever.

These cinnamon rolls are freakin' delicious - I love them.  CA really loved them and ate them long past when I thought that eating the leftovers was safe.  I have a 3 day rule on leftovers and he has a 2 week rule.

Before you worry about why we had leftovers and conclude that it's because these aren't amazing, notice that I made a full 9x13 dish of cinnamon rolls for 2 people.  We gave a few away to coworkers but kept a lot of them at CA's insistence so you should not take the existence of week-long leftovers to be any indication as to the deliciousness of this recipe.  It's great.  The dough is soft and pumpkiny and yeasty.  The filling is sweet and nutty.  The icing is deliciousy and mapley and rummy.  Just plain good.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls with Maple Rum Icing
Adapted from Bakerella

Ingredients

For the Dough
4 cups Flour
1/4 cup Sugar
1/2 tsp Salt
2 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice (3:1:1:1 mixture of cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and allspice)
4 T Butter
1 cup Whole Milk
2 1/4 tsp (1 packet) Active Dry Yeast
1 Egg
3/4 cups Pumpkin Puree

For the Filling
1/2 cup Butter, melted and divided
1 1/2 T Cinnamon
1/3 cup Brown Sugar, packed
1/4 cup Granulated Sugar
1 cup Pecans, toasted and coarsely chopped

For the Icing
2 cups Powdered Sugar
2 T Butter
1 T Maple Syrup
1 T Dark Rum
2 T Whole Milk

Instructions
Combine flour, sugar, salt and spices with a wire whisk in a medium bowl. Transfer 3 cups of the flour mixture to the bowl of your stand mixer and set the remaining 1 cup aside.

Heat butter and milk in the microwave until the butter is melted and set aside until warm. Sprinkle yeast on the surface of the warm milk/butter mixture and let rest for about 5 minutes. Then gently stir together and add to the flour mixture. Mix on low using the paddle attachment until combined. Add egg and mix until combined and then add pumpkin and mix until combined.

Change to the dough hook and add the remaining one cup flour and knead on low speed for about 10 minutes.

Spray a medium bowl with non-stick spray. Then remove dough from mixing bowl. Knead a couple of times, shape into a ball and place in coated bowl. Turn over to coat both sides. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm spot for 2 hours until it doubles in size or in the refrigerator overnight.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Butter or spray a 9 X 13 baking dish.

Turn out dough onto a well floured work surface and roll into a roughly 12 X 18 inch rectangle until it's about 1/4 inch thick.  Place the dough so that the long side is facing you.

Spread 6 T of the melted butter on the dough, reserving the additional 2 T. Then sprinkle cinnamon, sugar, brown sugar and chopped pecans until the dough is covered.

Start with the long side farthest from you and start rolling the dough toward you to form a log. Roll tightly and shape as you go if necessary. Then turn the dough log seam side down and cut into 15-18 equal sections using a serrated knife.

Place on prepared baking dish, brush with the remaining 2 T of melted butter and let rise again in a warm spot for about 30 minutes before baking. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the rolls are set in the center the tops are golden brown.

While the rolls are baking, make the icing.  Heat the butter over medium heat until it melts and turns golden brown. Watch closely so it does not burn.  Add the powdered sugar and whisk until combined.  Whisk in the maple syrup, rum and milk until completely smooth.

Remove rolls and spread icing over cinnamon rolls while still warm.

Enjoy!
Julie