In This Post: Cream Cheese Frosting Cinnamon Rolls
Cinnamon Rolls. Cream Cheese Frosting. Yes.
It seems almost silly to write any more since you, like most normal people, saw “Cinnamon Rolls” and are like, “Yes! In! This is the only gift I need this holiday season!”
You probably started thinking about your favorite part of the cinnamon roll which is OF COURSE, the center. The gooey, soft, pull-apart, cinnamon-slathered, sweet, perfectly glazed bite. The bite you waited for the whole time or, if you’re like some of us, the only bite you took and then discarded the rest because why botherrrrr?!
Well, what if the whole cinnamon roll *was* like the center? What if every single bite was light and soft and buttery and sweet? What if the entire thing was draped in a silky smooth cream cheese frosting that seeped and sneaked into every single available warm cinnamony pocket? Yes. Yes. Goodbye dry, hard frosting-less outer bready bits! We’re here for brioche and we’re never turning back.
Your holiday brunches, your quiet mornings with a hot cup of coffee before everyone wakes up, your treat plate on the counter where you sneak bites in between all the stirs and mashes and temp checks of holiday meal prep…all of this just got so much more delicious.
Watch How To Make This Recipe
Ingredients You’ll Need
To make these pillowy cream cheese frosting cinnamon rolls come together, you’ll need some time and some patience and some butter. Those are definitely the big things, but there’s a few other ingredients on the list too.
- eggs
- flour
- yeast
- honey
- white, brown, and powdered sugars
- cinnamon
- vanilla
- cream cheese
- butter (butter lovers, this is your moment to shine!)
About that butter. The absolute key to this perfect cinnamon roll, in our humble opinion (but also not humble…hiiii this is the best cinnamon roll!), is the brioche dough. It’s soft and sweet and airy. It is absolutely made to be soaked in cinnamon and sugar and warm drippy frosting.
The Best Dough For Cinnamon Rolls
Trust – it’s easier than you think.
This brioche dough that we’re using is ultra-pillowy, soft, and luscious. Also: stupidly easy. I have zero time for fussy bread recipes, so you know this is doable. You will be big-time rewarded with fluffy dough and amazing bread smells for all your (slightly) hard work. And hard work = 30 seconds of stirring.
Here’s all you have to do:
- Combine water and yeast in a bowl.
- Add all the other dough ingredients. Mix with a wooden spoon until combined. It will be messy, sticky, and loose.
- Cover loosely and let her rest at room temperature for 1-2 hours until it has puffed up and doubled in size.
- Store in the fridge: Once the dough has doubled in size, put the bowl in the fridge, covered, to store at least overnight, so the dough has time to chill and become easier to handle.
You can do it!
What Else To Make With This Brioche Dough
If you love the texture of these rolls, which you will, this same dough recipe can be used in multiple ways! It’s a go to around here for lots of pillowy, plush, super tender baked yummies.
Here are my favorite ways to use that leftover dough:
- Gooey Caramel Monkey Bread (a brunch necessity!)
- Christmas Tea Ring with Raspberry Cream Cheese Filling (a family favorite perfect for Christmas morning)
- Ricotta Berry French Toast Casserole (french toast for a crowd!)
The Best Cream Cheese Frosting
You’re already going to be peeking in that warm oven and absolutely high-fiving yourself left and right as you watch them pillow up over the top of the pan, but there is still more glory to come! That’s right, it’s a fluffy, light, thin but not too thin, covers and drips over everything cream cheese frosting. Icing? Glaze? Reason for living? Whatever you call it, this one is just about perfect.
So there are some tips and tricks here because sometimes a frosting wants to lump, and we’re not having that. So you’ll want to make sure you use an electric mixer to whip it really smooth – the longer you mix it, and the higher the speed, the fluffier your frosting will be (but it then kinda melts down in the most wonderful way once it goes on the rolls).
Flavor Variations on The Cream Cheese Frosting
You can also have some fun here with these cream cheese frosting cinnamon rolls if you’re feeling it.
- A little maple syrup in that frosting perhaps?
- A swizzle of honey to bring out the honey in the brioche?
- Zest some orange in that filling or how about a splash of orange juice in your frosting for a sweet citrusy twist?
Play around, make them your own, make them again and again and again.
We really do not know how you could possibly go wrong! Even if you do get some lumps. Can fully attest that the whole team ate a full batch of these cinnamon rolls with RECKLESS ABANDON and zero regrets.
How To Make Perfect Cinnamon Rolls
There are some steps here. There is a little bit of time and planning and love that goes in, but what are the holidays if not time and planning and love. And we promise, absolutely all your efforts will be rewarded. BIG TIME.
- Make the brioche. This really is meant to be an overnight process. You’ll mix your dough together, all sweet with honey and rich with butter, and then cover her loosely and let her double in size (about 1-2 hours). After that, just go ahead and pop her in the fridge and go to bed. The brioche dough really is so much easier to work with after a chill because of all the…ahem, butter.
- The morning of. Mix together your filling: cinnamon, your sugars, and your melted butter. If you really want to get fancy you can stick some orange zest in there, maybe some cardamom, some cocoa?!
- Roll it out. When you’re ready in the morning, roll out your dough into a large rectangle.
- Form the rolls. Spread the filling over your dough and then roll it up, starting from the short end. Trim the uneven ends (but don’t you dare leave those! toss them in a ramekin and bake them up, make little cinnamon twists, give them to kids to play bakery with…point being, bake a tiny snack with them). Cut the log into 8 equal pieces and place them in your pan. Give them another 45 minute rest in a pre-warmed oven.
- Bake. After they rise, bake for about 22 minutes. Let the coziest, merriest, warmest kitchen smells commence!
In a way, making these perfectly soft, pillowy, sweet cream cheese frosting cinnamon rolls is a lot like gathering friends and family for the holidays. It takes a little time and patience and planning. But once everyone is all tucked in and ready to go, there’s nothing more warm, more cozy, more joy-giving than having them at the table.
Cinnamon Rolls: Frequently Asked Questions
If you have leftovers (ha!) keep them in a sealed container in the fridge and they should stay fresh for a few days! Reheat in the microwave or oven until warm.
Just pop it in the oven at 350 degrees for a quick 5 minute rewarming treatment, or about 15-20 seconds in the microwave.
Yes! See the notes section of this recipe for a sample timing option that shows how you can make these the night before and let them sit in the fridge until the next morning.
Make the dough the night before; let it rise from 8-10pm. Put it in the fridge. Roll out the rolls the next morning from 7:30-8am, let them rise from 8-9am, bake and be ready to eat by 9:30am.
This particular dough can hang out in the fridge for up to 5 days. I don’t like to leave the pre-rolled rolls in the fridge longer than overnight because I feel like the filling starts to seep out. But the dough ball itself can hang out for 5 days.
This happens to me every once in a while (due to variances in temperature of the room or temperature of ingredients). I find that it’s almost always because the dough is not warm enough yet. Assuming that your yeast was alive and you are smelling that sweet, yeasty smell from the dough, it just needs a bit more time, warmth, and moisture. Covering it with a damp towel and placing it near a warm oven for an extra 30-60 minutes should get it going. You can also try any of the tricks in this post– in particular I like the boiling water / oven method.
Source Notes: To get to light, pillowy, aggressively frosted cinnamon roll nirvana, I am using the method from the amazing cinnamon roll recipe in Bread in 5’s Holiday and Celebration cookbook (affiliate link). This is one of the best baking books I own for easy, do-able baking! Highly recommend and owe all credit for much of what I’ve learned about making brioche to them and this book!
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House Favorite Cinnamon Rolls with Cream Cheese Frosting
- Total Time: 12 hours 20 minutes
- Yield: 8 cinnamon rolls 1x
Description
Our House Favorite Cinnamon Rolls – the ones we make every year! With pillowy brioche dough and cream cheese frosting tucked into every bite.
Ingredients
Cinnamon Roll Brioche Dough:
- 1/2 cup lukewarm water (not hot water)
- 1 teaspoon instant yeast
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 cup butter, melted
- 2 eggs
- 3 tablespoons honey
- 2 1/2 cups flour + extra for dusting
Cinnamon Roll Filling:
- 3 tablespoons butter, melted
- 5 tablespoons white sugar
- 5 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Cream Cheese Frosting:
- 2 ounces cream cheese, softened
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
- 1/3 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons milk (more as needed)
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- small pinch of salt
Instructions
- Make the dough: Start by adding the water and yeast to a bowl. Melt the butter, whisk in the honey, then the egg and salt. Add your butter mixture to the bowl, and then measure in the flour. Mix with a wooden spoon until combined. It will be messy, sticky, and loose – that is correct.
- First rise: Cover loosely with plastic wrap or a damp towel, and let her rest at room temperature for 1-2 hours until the dough ball has puffed up and roughly doubled in size. I often turn on my oven to 200 degrees and place the dough bowl in close proximity to the fan to speed this process up.
- Store in the fridge: Once the dough has doubled in size, gently reach in with your hand and pull the sticky dough from the edges of the bowl. This should somewhat deflate the dough – that’s great. Put the bowl in the fridge, covered with plastic wrap. It needs at least 3 hours in the fridge so the dough has time to chill and become easier to handle. Don’t try to work with it right after the first rise – chilling is necessary to make it workable. The dough can stay in the fridge for up to 5 days.
- Assemble the rolls: Remove the dough from the fridge and coat the outside lightly with flour. Roll your dough ball out to about a 9×13 rectangle. This dough doesn’t like to be over-handled, and you don’t want to have to add a lot of extra flour – so work with it right out of the fridge.
- Filling: Brush the rectangle with the melted butter and sprinkle with the sugars and cinnamon. You can use your hands to press it in and make sure it’s all evenly coated.
- Roll: Roll the dough up starting at the short side. Try not to over-handle the dough as it will become sticky. Once the log is rolled up, use floss or a very sharp knife to trim the uneven ends, and then cut the log into 8 equal rolls. Place the rolls in a 9-10 inch round baking dish or pie plate (another size could also work, I just like how they fit in a round pan with 7 around the outside and one in the center).
- Second rise: Preheat the oven to 200 degrees and then turn it off. Cover the pan loosely with plastic wrap or a damp towel and let the rolls rest in the turned-off oven for 45 minutes. They should fit a little more snugly together in the pan at this point. Cute! Take them out and turn the oven back on to 350 degrees. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-22 minutes.
- Prep the cream cheese frosting: Use an electric mixer to beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth and creamy. Mix in the powdered sugar, vanilla, and a little bit of milk at a time until you get a smooth glaze; then continue to beat with the electric mixer until you have a light and fluffy frosting.
- Frost and enjoy: When they come out of the oven, give them a minute to cool. Then brush or spoon them with the frosting so it gets every crevice coated with gooey, drippy deliciousness. You can frost them again (second layer!) once they’ve cooled a bit more. Savor every warm, pillowy, glazed bite. YOU MADE THAT. Cinnamon roll bliss is yours!
Notes
Previous Version: A previous version of included extra dough for 3 batches of cinnamon rolls; you can find the previous version here. The updated recipe now is for ONE batch of cinnamon rolls. The video still reflects that older method of splitting the dough in 3; you can just ignore that, until we are able to get it updated. 🙂
Sample Timing – for less work in the morning: Make the dough the morning before; let it rise from 8-10am. Put it in the fridge. Roll out the rolls in the afternoon or evening, cover, and put back in the fridge. Take the rolls out first thing the next morning, rise from 7-8am, bake and be ready to eat by 8:30am.
Sample Timing – for last-minute people: Make the dough the night before; let it rise from 8-10pm. Put it in the fridge. Roll out the rolls the next morning from 7:30-8, let them rise from 8-9am, bake and be ready to eat by 9:30am.
Fridge Time: This particular dough can hang out in the fridge for up to 5 days. I don’t like to leave the pre-rolled rolls in the fridge longer than overnight because I feel like the filling starts to seep out. But the dough ball itself can hang out for 5 days.
Freezing: Currently freezing isn’t a part of my routine for these because I find that the dough is so rich and buttery that it’s hard to get a good second rise. I prefer to just work within that 5 day timeframe and store them in the fridge during that time!
If your dough is not rising: This happens to me every once in a while (due to variances in temperature of the room or temperature of ingredients). I find that it’s almost always because the dough is not warm enough yet. Assuming that your yeast was alive and you are smelling that sweet, yeasty smell from the dough, it just needs a bit more time, warmth, and moisture. Covering it with a damp towel and placing it near a warm oven for an extra 30-60 minutes should get it going. You can also try any of the tricks in this post– in particular I like the boiling water / oven method.
- Prep Time: 12 hours
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Bake
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: cinnamon rolls, maple glaze, homemade cinnamon rolls
More Holiday Brunch Recipes We Love
- Gooey Caramel Monkey Bread (this caramel is not messing around – it’s so good!)
- Christmas Tea Ring with Raspberry Cream Cheese Filling (family favorite!)
- Carrot Cake Coffee Cake (perfect sweet addition to the holiday table)
- Biscuits and Gravy Egg Bake (the ultimate brunch recipe mash-up!)
- Egg and Croissant Brunch Bake (a classic brunch crowd-pleaser!)
- Breakfast Enchiladas with Roasted Poblano Sauce (a little something different that will blow. your. mind.)
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POY team, you’ve done it again! I’ve made these rolls four times in one week; they’re so good!! Thank you for creating such delicious and accessible recipes!!! I’ll be making this one again and again. ❤️❤️
I made the dough for these two evenings before Christmas Eve, when we planned to eat them. The dough was so simple to make and kept fine in the fridge for about a day. Then I just followed the “Sample Timing for less work in the morning” option in the notes of the recipe and it was a wonderful breeze to enjoy while opening presents! I just adore that you take the time to provide options to make my life easier – and they actually work. I am a POY fan for life!
So glad they were a success!
My dough never rose. ;( so so disappointed. So much for Christmas morning cinnamon rolls. I think my water was too warm. Either way this is not a recipe for a novice.
Oh my! These are amazing, the best cinnamon rolls I’ve ever made in my 45 years of baking! Thank you!
So glad you enjoyed them!
Honestly wtaf
These are SO good!! I was looking for an alt to cinnamon buns, decided to try this recipe and just change the filling. Amazing stuff honestly! The one thing I’d change now is actually chill the dough overnight cause god was it hard to work with after 4h 😂 terribly soft and moist and tasty and all things good!!
Fyi if anyone’s looking for alt fillings I did natural pecan butter & homemade salted caramel sauce. To die for, obvs.
Hi,
Made these once and were great! Question: Would it be a good idea to add heavy cream on top before baking?
Hi! I have always made these for Christmas morning but I use the old version that triples the batch. I tried the single batch version this year and it calls for two eggs and the dough was VERY messy. I know it says it will be messy but the rolls also tasted extra egg-y. In the directions it says to add “the egg” but in the ingredients list it calls for two. I’m wondering if I was only supposed to add one egg, not two…HELP!
Not a recommendation! But I accidentally put 3tbsp butter in the dough instead of the 1/2 cup. Was really worried the rolls would be tough and chewy, but they were great! Great, foolproof recipe!
Made this dough on a Thursday to bake on a Sunday. I’m afraid my dough didn’t rise. What will happen when I bake it? Will they just be flat? Or should I just start over?
I know they were warm enough bc I placed them in front of a wood stove for 2+ hours. Any ideas where I went wrong?
I check the temp of my water. It was 90ish. Let it sit with the yeast. Then added other ingredients as stated in recipe. I let the butter cool, but it was def warm. Eggs were cold.
Hi Lindsay,
You are incredibly talented! Every one of your recipes that I have made turned out perfectly. I also adore how you write your recipes to cheer us on and help us know the little tricks to ensure success.
Your cinnamon roll recipe with the brioche bread is absolutely incredible.
Thank you!!!
Rainey
I once had cinnamon rolls in the Emirates (UAE), and the taste was so terrible it could have very well been a substitute for I don’t know, maybe a bottle of concentrated cinnamon essence – it didn’t taste like really good stuff.
When you used the cinnamon, was it cassia cinnamon or seylany cinnamon that you used? Any advice about it?
I love this recipe, the cinnamon rolls are divine.
Has anyone tried making a savory roll with the brioche dough? There isn’t much sugar in it so I wonder what a ham and Gruyère roll would be like.
Amazing!
Dough was very easy to work with. I did all of the prep the day before. The morning of, took rolls out of the fridge for 30 min to rise while the oven preheated, they rose beautifully! Added orange zest to the frosting, yum!
I love to cook and use your recipes often, but I’m not much of a baker. Making homemade cinnamon rolls for our Christmas breakfast has been a longtime goal, but I’ve always been intimidated. While this recipe (like all cinnamon roll recipes) is time-consuming, it was easy to follow, and my rolls turned out beautifully! They were so light and fluffy! We all loved them!
Can I make the frosting the day before, store in an airtight container, then microwave it and frost the rolls the next morning? Trying to save all the time on Christmas morning!
The comment at the beginning of this recipe and in the video is states that this recipe makes a very large batch, in the video it states the divide your dough into 3 parts to make 3 batches of 6 rolls, but I don’t see any of that specified in the written directions. How much does this recipe make? One single batch or 3??
Love these! I’m excited to make them for Christmas again. I’ve made them a few times throughout the year and they’re always a hit. So soft and fluffy!
I loved these last year for Christmas! They were a big hit. Since then we’ve had a dairy allergy develop. Any ideas? Can I use coconut oil instead of butter? What ideas for a cream cheese substitute ?
Thank you!
I’d use a plant-based butter and then a plant-based cream cheese as well!
I just prepped the dough and it’s doing the 2 hour rise before going into the fridge.
I’ve learned to thoroughly read the steps, so I watched the video too.
It doesn’t say anything about the dough being split into three in the written directions, so I’m confused! Should I divide it into three if I followed the 2.5 cup flour recipe?
Hi, I tried this recipe and it turned out to be super great and yummy. My whole family ate them in an hour. I really like your content and hope to make more of your recipes soon!
Could we have this recipe in grams too? Since that is how Lindsay is making it anyway…trying this out for this first time, and the dough is in the oven doing its first rise!
Hi, Christina! You should be able to switch the recipe to show metric measurements and grams within the recipe card near the top. Feel free to email us at hello@pinchofyum.com if you need additional assistance though.
Made these for Christmas morning and they were amazing! I used active yeast and didn’t need to change a thing. I have a second batch of rolls in my freezer and waiting for a excuse to bake them!
My wife is a cinnamon roll connoisseur so we’re always looking for the perfect recipe and I think we’ve found it! This was definitely the best of many, many recipes I’ve tried; every bite was soft, the cream cheese icing was the perfect compliment, and they were really simple to make. The only modification I’ll make next time is doubling the cinnamon and sugar filling (she likes them extra gooey).
I made these cinnamon rolls this morning to celebrate the New Year. Verdict: DIVINE!!! I did everything except bake the frost the rolls yesterday (NYE). After our morning walk, popped them in the oven, frosted them, and served with scrambled eggs.
The brioche is perfect for cinnamon rolls. Other recipes I’ve tried have a much heavier dough. And the cream cheese frosting is perfect. We’re all in a cinnamon roll coma as I write this.
Thank you! I will be making these again and again!
Honestly the BEST cinnamon rolls I’ve ever had. This is my third Christmas in a row making cinnamon rolls and I was hoping this recipe would be *the one* and it is! So incredibly pillowy and delicious. I didn’t have cream cheese so I made a vanilla buttercream frosting, which turned out delicious with them!