Gluten Free Cinnamon Rolls Recipe

Before going gluten free I would make cinnamon rolls quite a bit.  We always ate them on Christmas morning, but we also ate them about once a month.  I would use whole wheat flour in them and they were so good.  The best part was that they would rise.  That is what I miss the most after going gluten free.  Things that rise.

I am pleased to announce that I finally found the perfect recipe and mix of flours to get my cinnamon rolls to rise again!

I used Ree Drummond, The Pioneer Woman Cooks recipe but tweaked it to be my own!

Here is the recipe I used, notice this is what I used not what the original recipe calls for.  You'll need to go to the actual recipe to view the regular gluten filled recipe.

Ingredients:
1 quart lactose free whole milk(or can use goat milk)
1 cup olive oil
1 cup demerara sugar(I ground this up with a coffee grinder to make it very fine)
2 Tb active dry yeast
8 cups(plus 1 cup separated) gluten free flour blend
2 tsp guar gum
1 heaping tsp baking powder
1 scant tsp baking soda
1 Tb salt
melted butter(I use real butter and used 1 cup)
2 cups finely ground demerara
cinnamon(I didn't measure this, but I used quite a bit because I love cinnamon)

Heat the milk up in a saucepan with the olive oil and 1 cup sugar over medium heat.  You want to scald this well.  For those that don't know to scald is to get it to the point right before boiling.  Normally you'll see bubbles starting to form around the edge of the pan.

Remove this from heat and set aside until it is just warm, no longer hot.  Sprinkle the 2 Tb yeast over the top of this.  I let this set for around 10 minutes or until you can smell the yeast working and start to bubble or froth.

Add the 8 cups of flour.  Stir until combined.  Then cover with a clean kitchen towel and let set aside in a warm place for one hour.  This allows it to start rising and lets the yeast continue to feed and build.

After the 1 hour, remove the towel and add the guar gum, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and last cup of flour.  Stir thoroughly to combine it all.  Here is where you have a choice to make. You can either use the dough all up now,  refrigerate part of it, etc.  I always just use it all up now!  However, the recipe did say you can refrigerate for up to 3 days, I'm not sure though what this would do with gluten free dough.

Now comes the fun of making the cinnamon rolls!!

Take half the dough to work with and put the other half in the refrigerator for now.  I took and put  some parchment paper down on my countertop and put a small sprinkling of my flour blend on that to help with sticking.  I then placed the dough ball down and put a bit more flour on top of that to allow me to roll it out into a good sized rectangle.  The recipe says 30 by 10 inches, but I didn't measure mine.  I made it the same size of my parchment paper.  Very important not to go off the paper as it's important to help with rolling.

Now is the fun part.  Melt up your butter and place it on the dough.  Use your hands or a pastry brush to smooth the butter out over the dough.  This is going to help it stick together so use a good amount.  Sprinkle half of the finely ground demerara(so 1 cup) over the dough and cover with cinnamon.  If it's doesn't look like it's going to be enough you're free to add more butter, cinnamon, or sugar of course!

Now is the part that can be tricky with gluten free, the rolling up.  I took the edge of parchment paper furthest from me and slowly pulled it up off the counter and towards me.  Just the edge.  You don't want to pull too much up or it won't roll correctly.  The dough falls down off the edge and ontop of the next part and you just continue to gently do this until it's fully rolled.

Cutting.  I have always used a knife to cut my cinnamon rolls.  You cut them to your desired thickness.  I cut mine at about an inch thickness each.  You can do smaller or larger at your own taste.

Take the pan you're going to use.  I have an 11 by 19 cake pan that I use.  Put more butter into the bottom of the pan and swirl it to make sure the sides get coated as well.  Then place the cut cinnamon rolls into the pan.  If I have any cinnamon sugar mixture that has oozed out of the cinnamon rolls I make sure to scrape that off and put it on top of the rolls before baking.

Preheat the oven now for 375 degrees and place the pan of rolls on the counter covered with a kitchen towel.  Let these set for at least 20 minutes to let them rise again.

Bake for 15-18 minutes or until golden brown.  Don't let them get too brown or they'll be hard and dried out.

Fresh out of the oven.

You can use the icing recipe that The Pioneer Woman uses with this recipe but I just made a simple cream cheese icing recipe and topped them with that.  Best served warm.  These were so good!   Yum!

Gorgeous and delicious!

Shared on:  Wellness Wednesdays, Simple Living Wednesdays, Allergy Free Wednesdays, Homemaking Linkup, Wise Woman Linkup, Real Food Wednesday, Proverbs 31 Thursdays, Thrifty Thursday, Gluten Free Fridays,