Gluten Free Cinnamon Rolls | Better than Cinnabon

These sweet, tender gluten free cinnamon rolls rise quickly and easily, and make the whole house smell amazing. Make weekend mornings special!

Why I love this recipe

These fluffy rolls are just sweet enough for you to enjoy the delicious icing. The dough is enriched with an egg and butter, making it very tender, and easier to handle and shape. The rolls are so pillowy-soft that your family will never know they're gluten free if you don't tell them.

Warm, fluffy cinnamon rolls just like these were a family staple of mine growing up. They were homemade, but we didn't make them ourselves.

Recipe ingredients

For the rolls

• Gluten free flour blend: Be sure to use one of my recommended gluten free flour mixes, and only add xanthan gum to it if the blend doesn't already contain it. When I use Better Batter, I omit the xanthan gum; when I use Nicole's Best, there is no xanthan gum in the mix so you can add the precise amount of 3 teaspoons (1 tablespoon) xanthan gum here.
• Tapioca starch: This is an additional ingredient, even though all good-quality all purpose gluten free flour blends already contain tapioca starch (also called tapioca flour) as an ingredient. Adding more tapioca starch helps make the dough more elastic, easier to handle raw, and helps the rolls hold their shape during baking.
• Milk powder: Adds richness, helps the rolls brown in the oven, and adds protein. You can also use buttermilk powder, or coconut milk powder in its place.
• Instant yeast: Provides flavor as the rolls rise outside the oven, and lift when they rise in the oven; I like to use instant yeast because it doesn't have to be dissolved in liquid first to be activated. To use active dry yeast instead, just use 25% more by weight (here, just under 8 grams) and dissolve it first in 1/4 cup of the milk.
• Cream of tartar: Helps stabilize the rise. You can use 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice instead.
• Baking soda: Helps the rolls turn golden brown in the oven. We don't add baking powder, which would be for rise, since the rise comes from the yeast.
• Brown sugar: Adds sweetness, tenderness, and depth of flavor.
• Salt: Balances sweetness, brightens other flavors. I usually use kosher salt because it's easier to measure properly without overmeasuring, but table salt works fine. Just use a tiny bit less.
• Apple cider vinegar: Helps add tenderness and some yeasty flavor. You can use white wine vinegar in its place.
• Butter: Adds flavor and tenderness. Be sure to use butter at room temperature, not melted butter, which is more likely to make the dough greasy during shaping and leak in the oven.
• Egg: One egg adds structure, richness, and helps stabilize the rolls. Eggs can be really useful in gluten free baking, especially of yeast breads, to support the more fragile gluten free dough.
• Milk: Adds moisture, richness, and flavor. You can use a nondairy milk here, but make sure it isn't nonfat since we need the fat for richness.

For the filling

• Butter: Adds richness and helps create a paste with the brown sugar so it stays in place.
• Brown sugar: Adds sweetness and lots of flavor to the center of the rolls, which is the best part!
• Cinnamon: Adds tons of woodsy flavor and combines with brown sugar for the characteristic cinnamon roll aroma.

For the optional glaze and/or frosting

• Confectioners' sugar: Adds sweetness and stability to the icing or the frosting; powdered sugar is only sugar, but confectioners' sugar has added cornstarch which makes the frosting more stable
• Milk: Hydrates the confectioners' sugar in the glaze to create a pourable icing
• Butter: Adds richness and makes the frosting spreadable and full of flavor. It should be at room temperature so it can be beaten, not melted where it will leak out of the frosting
• Heavy cream: Just a few tablespoons thins the frosting enough to make it spreadable, so it melts into the warm cinnamon rolls

How to make gluten free cinnamon rolls

These step by step photos for how to make this recipe are designed to make it easy for you to imagine exactly how to make these cinnamon rolls at home. For full instructions including exact quantities and a full printable recipe, be sure to scroll down to the recipe card.

Whisk dry ingredients, then add wet

This dough comes together so quickly and easily in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. Begin by whisking together the dry ingredients (flours, yeast, salt, brown sugar, cream of tartar), and adding the wet ingredients (butter, milk, an egg, a splash of vinegar). The recipe doesn't call for vanilla extract, but you could add 1 teaspoon of it for flavor if you like.

Beat the mixture well

Beat everything together well in your stand mixer. The mixture will clump at first, but just keep on beating until it starts to look a bit whipped and shaggy. To make the dough easier to handle, place it in a sealed container and refrigerate for 20 to 30 minutes.

Roll, fill & shape the dough

To shape the dough, sprinkle it with a bit of flour to smooth it out, then roll it into a rectangle, sprinkling lightly with flour as needed. Spread some soft butter on top, then sprinkle brown sugar & cinnamon. Roll the dough into a coil, and slice with (of all things) dental floss if you have it.

Let the rolls rise, then bake

Place the raw rolls in a greased casserole dish, cover it, & let them rise. You only want them to swell to about 50% bigger than they started. You'll know when the rolls are closer together than they were before. Bake at 350°F for about 25 minutes.

Add frosting, and serve warm!

Let the rolls cool out of the oven for only about 10 minutes before adding icing (a simple milk and sugar mixture) or frosting (a thin buttercream icing). A cream cheese frosting is also delicious if, instead of 6 tablespoons of butter, you use 4 ounces of cream cheese and 2 tablespoons of butter. You want the frosting or icing to melt a bit when you spread it on. Let it set briefly, and serve warm.

Recipe tips and tricks

Begin with cold dough

This dough is easiest to work with when it's cold. If you can, place the raw dough in a tightly sealed container (plastic is fine) and refrigerate it for at least 30 minutes before working with it.

When the dough is cold, you'll be much less likely to incorporate a lot of extra flour into it during shaping. If you do add too much flour during shaping, you will lower the hydration ratio of your dough and the yeast won't be able to be active.

Practice patience

If you only take away one piece of advice about baking with yeast, it should be the importance of patience. Of course, you don't want your rolls to overproof (or over-rise), as they'll break apart even before they bake in the oven. But yeast takes time to grow.

Baking with yeast is also very environment-dependent. If the environment in your kitchen is cooler or the air is very dry, the yeast will continue to grow, just more slowly.

Maintain the right temperature

Extremely high temperatures and extremely low temperatures can kill the yeast. Once the dough is about 50% larger than when it started rising, it's considered fully risen. 

This type of gluten free yeast dough won't usually double in size during the rising phase. Before it reaches a true doubling, it will start to get pock-marked and overly soft.

The bulk rise, which is the only necessary rise for this dough, should take about 45 minutes. I typically turn on my oven to 300°F and set the covered and shaped dough on top of the range. But if it takes longer than an hour, let it go longer.

Overproofing happens when the dough has proofed too much, not when it's been left to rise for “too long.” There is no “too long” for proofing unless the dough has over-proofed. But if you don't let the dough rise for long enough before baking, it will be dense after baking.

Roll your raw dough 1/2-inch thick

Be sure not to roll your cinnamon roll dough too thin, or the dough will break as you roll the filling inside. Too thick, and you won't be able to fit in enough filling—or get much of a pretty swirl!

Use a dental floss or a very sharp knife for slicing the rolls

To slice the roll cleanly from the coiled log, use a piece of unwaxed, unflavored dental floss. You can also use a a very sharp knife, and saw gently, rather than cutting in one motion, or you'll compress or tear the dough.

Making gluten free cinnamon rolls in advance

My Aunt Bia's used to make her rolls in these round disposable tins and bake them partially. That way, they could be defrosted, finished in the oven and served fresh any time at all.

Here's how you can make them in advance like Bia used to:

• Prepare and shape the raw rolls, let them rise, and then bake them at 300°F until puffed and very very pale golden, about 15 minutes. This is called parbaking them, so the yeast does its rise and they're set.
• Remove the rolls from the oven, and let them cool completely to at room temperature.
• Cover the dish tightly with freezer-safe wrap, and freeze them.
• Defrost the dish at room temperature, and bake them at 350°F for about 10 minutes, or until the filling is bubbling and the rolls are just starting to brown a bit.
• Let them cool for about 10 minutes before icing or frosting the rolls, and serve warm.

Storage & refreshing tips

Storing baked gf cinnamon rolls

Once your rolls are baked, before you add the glaze, you can cool them completely and freeze them in a single layer. Just wrap them first very tightly in freezer-safe wrap, and they warm up perfectly.

Reheating gluten free sweet rolls

If your rolls aren't just out of the oven, we can still make them taste like they are! Try letting them defrost at room temperature until they're no longer frozen in the center, then sprinkle them with some water and refresh them in a 275°F oven or toaster oven.

Ingredients & substitution suggestions

How to replace the dairy

To make these rolls dairy-free, you can try replacing the milk powder with powdered coconut milk. The butter in both the rolls and the filling can be replaced with a vegan butter that softens nicely at room temperature, like Melt brand or Miyoko's Creamery brand. For milk, use your favorite unsweetened nondairy milk, but make sure it has some fat, like almond milk.

How to replace the egg

Since there is only 1 egg in this recipe, I expect that it would work well with a “chia egg” substitute (1 tablespoon ground white chia seeds mixed with 1 tablespoon lukewarm water and allowed to gel).

How to replace apple cider vinegar &/or cream of tartar

In place of apple cider vinegar, you can use 1 teaspoon white wine vinegar. In place of cream of tartar, try 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice.

Choosing a gluten free flour blend

You really must use one of my recommended gluten free flour blends for this recipe. All of my gluten free recipes are designed to be made with one of my recommended blends, but yeast bread in particular is even more sensitive to flour substitutions.

I highly recommend using Better Batter (or my mock Better Batter) gluten free flour blend in yeast bread applications like this. I have successfully made this recipe with both Cup4Cup and my Better Than Cup4Cup blends, though, and the rolls are fluffier but the recipe still works.

Make sure you're using milk powder or buttermilk powder and not liquid buttermilk for that ingredient, or your dough will be too sticky to handle. You'll also use liquid milk as a separate ingredient.

FAQs