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When I asked you lovely people (in my Christmas Cracker Toffee post) which of my multitude of Christmas recipes I should post first, “cinnamon rolls” was the resounding answer. Therefore, you get cinnamon rolls! Yummy low carb cinnamon rolls that you don’t have to feel guilty about eating (and they’re gluten/nut free as well!)…. Coming up tomorrow: Jalapeno Popper Dip for all the Christmas social functions.
PS – did you see the holiday recipe roundup/THM gift card giveaway I posted yesterday? Check it out here!
Mozzarella dough is the newest low carb sensation, but I’ve been behind the curve (working on my cookbook…what’s new?) and hadn’t tried it yet. When Carolyn over at All Day I Dream About Food posted these awesome-looking Chocolate Walnut Swirls using a mozzarella dough, I knew that I had to try this miraculous cheese dough that doesn’t taste like cheese. It has so many possibilities (you’ll definitely see it from me again). I used Carolyn’s recipe as inspiration, made some tweaks to use my Baking Mix and try to get the dough to rise a little more, and made cinnamon rolls! Low carb cinnamon rolls have been on my list for awhile now, and the cheese dough idea brought them to life. It does an awesome job of replicating a glutinous dough without the gluten (and the flour that it usually comes in). These cinnamon rolls don’t rise quite as much as regular bread dough, but I wasn’t expecting them to and they actually exceeded my expectations!
These cinnamon rolls are definitely best fresh and warm out of the oven. If you have leftovers (that’s a big if), reheat them before serving to get them back to their nice soft texture.
They don’t really need frosting, but I’m used to cinnamon rolls with frosting so I wanted to at least provide an option. This frosting happens to be pretty amazing on its own, and you could definitely use it in other applications if you like.
I hope you enjoy your cinnamon rolls! Leave a comment below and tell me if you have a traditional Christmas breakfast that you like to serve at your house…
You can find a tweaked version of this recipe in my cookbook, Necessary Food.
- 1½ cups shredded part skim mozzarella cheese
- 4 T salted butter
- ¾ cup Briana's Baking Mix
- 2½ tsp. baking powder
- 2 tsp. THM Super Sweet Blend
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- -
- 4 T butter, softened
- 5 tsp. THM Super Sweet Blend, divided
- ½ tsp. Grandma's molasses
- Cinnamon
- 4 oz. reduced fat cream cheese, softened
- ¼ cup Greek yogurt
- 2 T salted butter, softened
- ½ tsp. vanilla extract (maple would be good too)
- 3 doonks THM Pure Stevia Extract Powder (a doonk is 1/32 tsp.), or more to taste
- Melt the cheese and butter together in a nonstick saucepan over medium heat until melty and stringy. Meanwhile, whisk together the baking mix, baking powder, and Sweet Blend. When the cheese is melted, turn the heat to low and stir in the dry ingredients, eggs, and vanilla until combined. Knead it a few times with your hands if needed to fully combine everything.
- Turn the dough out onto a large sheet of parchment paper (or two pieces of wax paper taped together). Using a rolling pin and making as few strokes as possible, roll the dough out to 14 inches wide by 11 inches long. Spread with the melted butter. Mix 1 T THM Sweet Blend with the molasses to make a "brown sugar". Sprinkle over the dough (this can be kind of hard to do evenly because it tends to clump together, but just give it your best shot. It's not an exact science.) Sprinkle the remaining two teaspoons of THM Sweet Blend over the dough evenly. Sprinkle the dough with plenty of cinnamon (enough so you can barely see the dough-we like lots of cinnamon), then roll it up from top to bottom (or bottom to top) into a long log (14 inches long, to be precise).
- Use a piece of sewing thread (this is my mom's foolproof method of getting a nice clean cut-see the Notes section for an explanation) to cut the log into 12 sections and place the sections into a greased 9-inch cake pan. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-21 minutes or until lightly brown on top.
- While the cinnamon rolls are baking, make the frosting by beating the ingredients together until smooth.
- The cinnamon rolls are best fresh and warm out of the oven, so let them set for a few minutes to slightly cool, then top the ones you're going to eat with frosting and devour! Store leftovers in the fridge. Chilling makes the dough stiffer and un-cinnamon roll-like, so heat the leftover cinnamon rolls (in the microwave, or covered in the oven) before eating. Store the frosting in the refrigerator so you can frost the cinnamon rolls as you're ready to eat them (you don't want to frost them all, then have to heat the leftovers and have your frosting run down all over the place. I mean, that's what I did, and they were still very good, but they'd be better the proper way...haha.). This makes more frosting than you'll need for the cinnamon rolls, but that means you have a few tablespoons left to use on mug muffins throughout the week. Yields 12 cinnamon rolls.
If using THM Baking Blend instead of my baking mix, I recommend using about a cup of THM Baking Blend since it's not as dry as my baking mix. Please note that THM Baking Blend is not nut free.
I personally have never made these in the evening and waited to bake them until morning, but I know that some people have done that and had success with it. I don't recommend making them very far ahead and waiting to bake them because I'm sure the baking powder loses some of its potency and the rolls won't rise as much.
Briana’s Baking Mix recipe
(Click here to see other recipes using my baking mix.)
Suggested products:
- Grandma’s Molasses (gluten and nut free)
- THM Super Sweet Blend and Pure Stevia Extract Powder can be purchased from the Trim Healthy Mama online store.
Briana, I buy our cheese at Aldi’s and I always have their shredded Italian blend on hand for our homemade pizzas. Do you think this cheese would work in place of the mozzarella? It’s no problem to buy mozzarella, but I was just curious if the other might work too! ?
Thanks for being my go-to-recipe-guru! ?
Hi Rene! I’m not familiar with the Italian blend, so I’m not sure. If it has any spices or strong-flavored cheese in it, I wouldn’t use it since you’re making sweet cinnamon rolls. Mozzarella is really mild and you don’t taste it in the rolls. 🙂
Do you have the nutritional info somewhere?
Hi Susan! I don’t usually calculate nutrition info on my recipes since the healthy eating lifestyle I follow doesn’t require it (Trim Healthy Mama), but MyFitnessPal is a super easy way to find nutrition facts!
What is a “doonk”? I may be having a bit of a foggy brain moment, but 1/32 of a teaspoon doesn’t really tell me much… 🙂
It’s the size of scoop that usually comes with pure stevia extract powders. 🙂 Trim Healthy Mama coined the term.
Hi there
I would love to try this recipe, but what can I use as a substitute for the following ingredients? (I live in South Africa and your stuff is not available here).
Briana’s Baking Mix
THM Baking blend
Many thanks
Regards
Shaan
Hi Shaan! You can find the recipe for my baking mix here: https://www.briana-thomas.com/recommends/brianas-baking-mix/
It’s actually something you can make yourself at home. If you don’t have all the ingredients called for in the baking mix recipe itself, you’ll probably just have to do some experimentation in substituting different flours, then see how the baking mix you came up with acts in recipes. Sometimes substituting flours changes the amount of liquid the baking mix will soak up so you’ll need to add either more or less baking mix in recipes that call for it. My baking mix can be used in place of THM Baking Blend; check out the link above for details about that. 🙂
Hi Briana!
I have been living the ketogenic lifestyle for 2.5 years and just found THM. I am able to incorporate a lot of the S recipes into my lifestyle. I made these this past Saturday with a couple of modifications in the sweetener because I don’t have any THM sweeteners but basically the same. Oh my Goodness!!! They were absolutely the BEST recipe for anything sweet I have made low carb.. I even had my non low carb family and friends try them and they said they felt guilty as if they had just eaten two small fair cinnamon rolls! Thank you so much. Can’t wait to try your pizza recipe! God Bless!
Oh wow! That’s great to hear!
I made these today and loved them! Wonder if this dough could be used for biscuits. How many cinnamon rolls can I eat at one time? It was hard to stop at 2, hehe.
Hi Evelyn! I used a similar dough to make the Cheddar Drop Biscuits in my cookbook. You might enjoy those. The number of rolls you can eat really depends on what else you’re eating at the same time. 2-3 is probably a good number. (There are no carb sources to watch out for to accidentally turn them into a crossover, if that’s what you’re wondering.)
Well this was disappointing to try on Christmas Eve. I made them for my diabetic sister in law as her Christmas gift and they didn’t raise one iota. Must have had the cheese and butter too hot, however I thought the point was to melt those ingredients. They taste good enough to give to her but they are dense and tiny. Lesson learned…try new recipe ahead of time!
How many carbs are in each one? I didn’t see the nutritional info.
Trim Healthy Mama, the healthy eating lifestyle I follow, focuses on not having to count, so I don’t usually calculate nutritional information. 🙂 You’re welcome to use an app like MyFitnessPal to do so, if you like.
Hi! I made these last night and they were fabulous!! I just reheated the last one and it was just as wonderful!!! Thank you for this recipe, you are truly gifted!! Anywho, can these be baked and then frozen so I could make several batches? Also, would I just thaw then reheat? I have a slew of family coming for Thanksgiving and would love to have plenty. Thank you again!
Hi Rana! I’m so glad you enjoyed them! I’ve never tried freezing them, so I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to your question. I’d guess that it would probably work fine (you might want to test it on one batch first), but I’d wait to frost them until thawing and reheating. 😉
Would it be simple to make these into Pecan Rolls? They look so much like them that I am thinking of trying it. My kids eat the store bought ones & when I smell them I want to shove one in my mouth so bad!! Lol… I need my own!! Thanks ahead for any help! 🙂
I’m not quite sure what you mean by pecan rolls. Could you describe them? You can always add nuts to these if you like.
What is the nutritional information?
I follow a healthy eating plan called “Trim Healthy Mama” which focuses on not having to count – it’s very nice! Because of this, I don’t calculate the nutritional info. 🙂 (But you’re welcome to do so using an app like My Fitness Pal.)
Quick question, I thought Molasses wasn’t allowed in Trim healthy mama cuz it’s so sugary? Sorry, I’ve been pondering this question for a while! 😉
1/4 tsp. per serving is allowed for flavor. 🙂
Ok! Thanks for answering! I meant to ask this in the above comment, but does it have to be a certain kind of molasses? You mention Blackstrap and Grandma’s Molasses a lot…
Blackstrap is preferred for its health benefits, but I prefer the taste of Grandma’s. It’s such a small amount that I wouldn’t be picky about the kind.
hello, thank you so much for this recipe but what is “T” -> “4 T butter…”
T = tablespoon
Hi Briana:
I want to try these this week. Since I have the THM Baking Blend – would I use 3/4 cup or 1 cup. I know you said your Baking Mix goes further.
You would use a cup of THM Baking Blend. 🙂 Substitution info is often included in the Notes section of my recipes.
I can not say thank you enough!! These are amazing. I thoroughly miss cinnamon rolls with my diabetes and wheat not agreeing with me. These are absolutely wonderful!!! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!!!
I’m so glad you enjoyed them! That makes me very happy.
I just made these and used another homemade baking blend that I already had on hand (one that claims to be a 1:1 ratio with THM Baking Blend). I regret that I used 1 cup instead of 3/4 cup like the recipe originally states. The cinnamon rolls were dry. They didn’t raise at all. The dough was very hard to work with and made a crumbly mess when I tried to roll them up. I will have to try them again with less flour and see how they are. I would recommend that the flour is not increased to 1 cup if you use Kris’ baking mix (http://www.meanderingwithmeg.com/trim-healthy-mama-homemade-baking-blend-recipe-fp/).
Thanks for the tip! Homemade baking mixes can vary so much that substitution can be tricky.
Made these with THM BB and used just shy of 1 cup based on comment above. I think it would’ve been fine if I had mixed the eggs and dry ingredients first and gave the bb time to absorb the liquid. But they were super sticky and tiny and didn’t even fill half of an 8×8 baking dish. Even with more bb, I don’t see how they could possibly fill a 9″ dish. In the oven now so we’ll see. Thinking I need to try again. ?
Is there anything I could sub the mozzarella cheese with? I can’t have dairy 🙁
The cheese is what gives these cinnamon rolls their unique texture, so I’m afraid not. I would suggest finding a cinnamon roll recipe that doesn’t use cheese as a main ingredient.
What, pray tell, is Grandma’s molasses?
thx!
It’s the brand of molasses I use. 🙂 It has a milder flavor than blackstrap, but you can use blackstrap if that’s what you have.
These look awesome! I haven”t tried a motz based dough yet. I’m enjoying your brownies tonight!
Briana thanks for this recipe!!!. I made these and they were good. I substituted maple syrup for the molasses and 2xgentle sweet for supersweet. So mine where not as sweet as I would have liked (my substitions fault) . The texture was great!! I was a bit shy with the cinnamon so I’ll use more next time.
For the frosting, I used half-half for the Greek yogurt (I was out). Again my frosting could have been sweeter too. I am looking forward to having all the ingridents next time. It was yummy despite my subs..
Thanks for sharing!!
I’m glad you enjoyed them! Great job making the recipe work with what you had on hand.
Is the pre grated yellow mozzarella ok or do i need the fresh white gooy one?
Pre-grated *white* mozzarella is what I used. I’ve never seen yellow mozzarella, but if it exists I wouldn’t recommend using it in this recipe because you want something very mild (so the flavor doesn’t clash with the cinnamon roll flavor).
Any idea if these would work egg free? Oh the joys of allergy… Perhaps I’ll try, but if someone already has I would be grateful. 🙂
I definitely wouldn’t suggest just leaving the eggs out because they’re pretty necessary for structure, but if you’d like to try a substitute, feel free to experiment!
Made these this morning. Definitely a repeat recip!!! I didn’t have any thread and used floss to cut… worked like a charm! Merry Christmas!
Do you think these would work as overnight cinnamon rolls? What I mean…Could I make them tonight, refrigerate them, and bake them in the morning? Or would that mess up the dough at all?
I’ve never done it like that and I assume they won’t rise quite as much because the baking powder will lose some of its strength, but I know that some people have done that with success.
Help, please.
I made these tonight, the favor is right, but other then that… I did something wrong.
My dough did not come together right. The cheese stuck to itself in stringy clumps. Then I may have over mixed trying to blend it with the dry ingredients. Do you have any thoughts on errors I may have made? They didn’t raise (or puff up at all) in the oven, I know I didn’t forget baking powder. I think this may be due to the trouble combining the melted butter and cheese w the dry ingredients aso well.
Thank you Briana, your thoughts would be appreciated.
Hi Pam, I’m afraid I don’t know what happened. Maybe you heated the cheese and butter on too high a temperature? I would try a lower temperature next time to let the cheese melt slowly. Overmixing could be part of the problem too. I would combine the ingredients gently with a spoon, leaving some cheese clumps, then knead a few times with my hands to get everything mostly mixed (make sure you whisk the dry ingredients together before adding them to the other ingredients so your baking powder is evenly distributed). I’m sorry you had trouble with them!
I think you’re right. I will try again and be more careful on the first step. thanks for your time and help. Merry Christmas!
Hi, I wondered if I could use THM BB instead? Same ratio? Thanks! These look yummy!
Check the Notes section of the recipe – I gave substitution info there. 🙂
Merry Christmas to alllll! Our family tradition has been home made cinnamon rolls, cream cheese frosting and scrambled eggs! Thank you for this lovely recipe! This will be a stop up from the recipe last year! You rock!
If you don’t have mozzarella cheese, I’m wondering if cottage cheese would work?
No, that wouldn’t have the same affect, I’m afraid.
Okay, thanks! Look good! Guess I’ll have to get some mozzarella. 😀
I made the cinnamon rolls this morning for our Christmas breakfast. Really turned out well except for 1 minor error! I forgot the CINNAMON! 🙁 And you say right in the directions, “Don’t forget the cinnamon.” I’m going to have to re-write that to say remember the cinnamon. Mercy! I was on my second roll before I realized “something” is missing! Tasted pretty good even without the cinnamon but I’m sure would have been absolutely delicious with the cinnamon. Ha Ha! Anyhow, I can now see why you say use a non-stick pan. Everything cooked up just fine but the clean up with a nightmare! I don’t own a non-stick pan but if I make these again, and I’m sure I will (with cinnamon), I am going to invest in a non-stick pan. Merry Christmas
you can also line the bottom of a pan with parchment paper for easier cleanup.
These look amazing! I need to stay away from dairy because it’s murder on my system, but I just may take a hit for these.lol. My traditional family Christmas breakfast was dairy-free egg nog french toast. We made it with King’s Hawaiian bread. My teenage daughter has been asking for it this year and I’ve been really sad about that because I know she misses the area where she grew up.
I miss it a ton too. We used to be able to get up the last few years we lived there and have a leisurely, fun Christmas morning with time to make breakfast and enjoy a relaxing day. Unfortunately, we had to move back where there is extended family and that makes for a lot of stress and demands on our time. Christmas is back to being about rushing and running from here to there to please everyone. 🙁
Aw, I hope you have a blessed Christmas – and I hope you can find some peace and relaxation even amongst the business. When you mentioned dairy free eggnog, I thought of this recipe that Robin at MamaShire just posted. I think you might find it interesting. 🙂 http://mamashire.com/eggnog-dairy-free-sugar-free/