Next time try my Cinnabon copycat sweet rolls!
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❤️ Why you'll love it
Absolutely the best homemade cinnamon rolls recipe ever- here's why...
- this pecan cinnamon roll recipe rises overnight in the refrigerator so you just pop them in the oven in the morning; fresh and warm sweet rolls for breakfast!
- big, soft, and buttery
- overflowing with gooey cinnamon and sugar and packed with toasted pecans
This is the big Texas cinnamon roll recipe we make around here - plate sized and full of gooey cinnamon and pecans then topped with plenty of rich icing!
Soft, buttery rolls have a thick ribbon of spicy cinnamon filling and a generous amount of toasted pecans.
After they're baked to a golden brown (and the kitchen smells like heaven) gooey vanilla butter icing is spooned on while they are still warm then more pecans are sprinkled over the top.
These pecan cinnamon sweet rolls are crazy easy! They're the perfect treat for Christmas morning!
🧾 Ingredients
Here's what you'll need to make this recipe. You'll find any notes about ingredients beneath the image.
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- all-purpose flour
- active dry yeast
- light or dark brown sugar - either works fine but dark brown gives a bit more caramel type flavor.
- vanilla extract
- kosher salt
- eggs
- buttermilk
- butter
- cinnamon
- powdered sugar
- pecans
🔪 Instructions
Note: This is an overview of the instructions. The full instructions are in the green recipe card below.
- Add a little of the sugar and yeast to some of the warm water in a small bowl. Set aside until foamy.
- Add to a large bowl of a stand mixer and mix in remaining ingredients until a soft dough forms.
- Knead with dough hook attachment.
- Place dough in a warm spot and let rise until double.
- Test to make sure the dough has doubled.
- Punch down.
- Spread with filling and toasted, chopped pecans.
- Roll up, pinch seam, and cut in equal slices - place rolls on a parchment covered cookie sheet, cover with plastic wrap, and let dough rise overnight in the refrigerator before baking. Next day bake pecan cinnamon rolls, add icing, and serve!
To toast pecans
To toast pecans place them on a heavy cookie sheet in a 350F oven for about 5 to 10 minutes stirring every minute or two until toasted. Watch that they don't burn!
🥄 Equipment
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🥫 Storage
*Store them, tightly covered, at room temperature for no more than 2 days. Freeze for longer storage.
Pecan cinnamon rolls are truly at their best when freshly made so plan on eating them the same day if possible. You can keep them, covered with plastic wrap, at room temperature for about 2 days but they'll get a little stale.
These freeze well, too. Place the cinnamon pecan rolls in an airtight freezer container with parchment paper between the layers and freeze for up to 3 months.
💭 Tips
Expert Tip: Oh NO! I'm out of powdered sugar! If you're out of Confectioner's (powdered) sugar you can try this easy substitute. Just blend 1-½ cups regular sugar and 1 tablespoon of cornstarch in a blender until powdered. It will take about a minute. Use as you would Confectioner's sugar.
- If you spray the inside of the plastic wrap with cooking spray it won't stick to the unbaked dough in the refrigerator or the frosting after the sweet rolls are done.
- When you melt the butter be sure to let it cool to at least 110F or a comfortable warm temperature before adding it to the yeast dough ingredients!!!
- Cutting the pecan cinnamon rolls from the roll is easy with dental floss! Just run a string under the roll, bring it up the sides, cross over on the top and pull gently. The floss will cut through the dough cleanly and easily.
- You can also cut through them with a sharp knife.
- Always place cinnamon rolls cut side down on the greased baking sheet.
- I add a pinch of chipotle to my cinnamon to make it a little spicy. About ⅛ to ¼ teaspoon per 2 tablespoons works for us.
👩🍳 FAQs
About 3 days if you punch it down once every 24 hours. After that it starts losing it's ability to rise.
Keep them tightly covered. If you won't be eating them in a day or two it's best to freeze them.
There are a lot of types of icing to use on cinnamon rolls. The one I share with this recipe is the easiest because it's just three ingredients and you can make it in about 2 minutes!
About 1 hour for the first rising and 30 minutes for the second. The actual time will depend on the temperature of the room they're rising in. If you are letting them rise in the refrigerator overnight then that's the only rising time they really need.
📚 Related recipes
- Overnight Apple Chipotle Cinnamon Rolls is another overnight cinnamon roll recipe with a deliciously spicy apple filling.
- Peanut Butter Sweet Rolls are a unique sweet roll that your peanut butter lovers will go "nuts" over.
- Fruit Kolache just like we have here in Texas.
- Honey Buttermilk Bread isn't a sweet roll but you can use the dough for about anything you want. It's amazing!
🍽️ Serve with...
I like to have homemade pecan cinnamon rolls with coffee but if you are having them as part of a holiday brunch or buffet try serving them with ...
- Southwestern Style quiche or Tex-Mex Eggs Benedict
- Sausage balls
- Make ahead yogurt parfaits
- Coffee punch or Mexican hot chocolate
These easy cinnamon rolls are about to become your family's favorite! They are so big and fluffy - fantastic on a brunch table.
The gooey cinnamon sugar is absolutely amazing!
Looking for quick and easy? Check out these cream cheese danishes you can make in 20 minutes!
If you click on the number of servings in the recipe card you can adjust the measurements up or down for the exact number of servings you need. Don't forget that you can click on "add to collection" to save it to your own, private recipe box!
If you love this recipe please give it 5 stars! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
📖 Recipe
Texas Pecan Cinnamon Rolls
Print Pin Recipe SaveEquipment Needed
Ingredients
Rolls
- 4 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- ¼ cup brown sugar, packed
- 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt, if using regular salt use just 1 teaspoon
- 2 packages active dry yeast
- ¼ cup water, 110F
- 1 cup buttermilk, warm (110F)
- ½ cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled to warm room temp
- 2 egg yolks, room temperature
- 2 eggs, room temperature
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
Filling
- 1 ⅓ cups brown sugar, packed
- ¼ cup cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon chipotle powder, optional
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ cup butter, melted, divided use
- 2 cups coarsely chopped pecans, , toasted
Topping
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- ⅓ cup butter, melted
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- cream to thin it out, as needed
- 1 ½ cups pecans, chopped & toasted
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Instructions
Dough
- Mix warm (110F) water and a tablespoon of brown sugar; stir in yeast.
- Set the mixture aside for a few minutes until it begins to bubble. I know this is no longer necessary but I think it still gives better results.
- Mix about 2 cups of the flour, eggs, egg yolks, remaining brown sugar and buttermilk into the yeast mixture until smooth.
- Add the vanilla, salt, and butter.
- Slowly add more flour until a soft dough is formed. You can do this by hand or with a heavy duty mixture and a dough hook.
- Once the dough holds together turn it out on a floured surface. You can also knead with your mixer if you prefer.
- Knead a few minutes until smooth and satiny, but still somewhat soft. It will feel like your earlobe if you pinch it.
- Place in a large, greased bowl and turn the ball of dough over to grease the top. Cover with a tea towel, place in a warm spot, and let rise.
- Let rise for 1 hour, or until double.
- Punch dough down; let rest for 5 minutes. This gets some of the elasticity out and makes it easier to roll.
- With a rolling pin roll the dough out into a rectangle that is about ½ inch thick or a little more.
Filling
- Spread the dough with ¼ cup of the cooled, melted butter.
- Mix the remaining ¼ cup of melted butter, cinnamon, salt, and brown sugar together.
- Spread this over the dough and sprinkle with the pecans pressing in lightly.
- Roll up as for a jelly roll, pinch the long edge to seal, and cut in 12 thick slices.
- Place the slices, cut side down, on a greased cookie sheet.
- Cover with greased plastic wrap.
- Refrigerate the rolls overnight. You can also just let them rise at room temperature for about an hour if you want to bake them immediately but they aren't as good.
- Next morning place the rolls on the counter while you preheat the oven. Remove the plastic wrap gently.
- Bake the pecan cinnamon rolls in a 375F oven about 30 minutes or until done. (An insta-read thermometer in pushed in the center will read 195-200F) Be sure to use a middle oven shelf and a heavy baking sheet. Watch carefully because the sugar will make the bottoms burn if you are not careful.
- Remove from the oven.
Icing
- While the rolls are baking mix the topping ingredients together until smooth.
- Spread on warm rolls.
- Cover with chopped pecans.
Notes
- If you spray the inside of the plastic wrap with cooking spray it won't stick to the unbaked dough in the refrigerator or the frosting after the sweet rolls are done.
- Cutting the pecan cinnamon rolls from the roll is easy with dental floss! Just run a string under the roll, bring it up the sides, cross over on the top and pull gently. The floss will cut through the dough cleanly and easily.
- You can also cut through them with a sharp knife.
- Always place cinnamon rolls cut side down on the greased baking sheet.
- I add a pinch of chipotle to my cinnamon to make it a little spicy. About ⅛ to ¼ teaspoon per 2 tablespoons works for us.
Nutrition Facts
Nutrition information is estimated as a courtesy. If using for medical purposes, please verify information using your own nutritional calculator. Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
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Is there anyone who doesn't like a good cinnamon roll recipe?
(I know as soon as I say that there will be some whackadoo that pipes up and tells me how much they hate them... So I'm sure there are those sort of people.)
To me cinnamon rolls sort of spell out the Roget's thesaurus version of "I love you."
Well, with these homemade cinnamon rolls it's more like: "I love, adore, cherish, like, affect, fancy, care for, take an interest in, be partial to, sympathize with; affection; be in love with; have a love for, entertain a love for, harbor cherish a love for; regard, revere; take to, bear love to, be wedded to; set one's affections on; make much of, feast one's eyes on; hold dear, prize; hug, cling to, cherish, pet, burn; adore, idolize, love to distraction, dote on, dote upon, take a fancy to, look sweet upon; become enamored; fall in love with, lose one's heart; desire... you."
These are the BEST cinnamon rolls ever. They're big as Texas, sweet as a baby kiss, and easy as pie.
It's like biting into a cloud of sweet, buttery, cinnamony perfection
. And there are pecans - masses of them. Chop them up but leave big chunks of pecan so that you get a good taste of it in every bite.
It's your choice. You can make those other kind of cinnamon rolls (bless your heart, or buy them, even) or you can make these.
I suppose some of it depends on how many synonyms you have on hand to describe your loved ones.
I swear, here in Texas pecans go in everything from chicken salad to ice cream. They are just so good!
We've got several native trees on our property and the nuts are so high in flavor that you wouldn't believe it. It's just a challenge to try to get them before the squirrels and worms!
First published October 2014. Last updated September 28, 2021 for better images and improved instructions.
Darlene
Hello and Thank you for such great bread / yeast recipes. I have not tried all them yet but the couple I have turned out wonderful. I have enjoyed reading through all the information and tips you have offered. I have just made this recipe and noticed (unless I miss read) I see to use tablespoon of brown sugar with the yeast , however the recipe calls for 1/4 cup. When do you add the rest of the sugar? with the flour and eggs and buttermilk? also in the filling I am assuming you add the salt in the cinnamon / br sugar slurry ? I can hardly wait till tomorrow for these rolls. Thank you
Marye
Yes! I've fixed the recipe. Thanks!
Thelma
I made the cinnamon rolls and your cloverleaf rolls. They both were delicious. Oh, I forgot your light bread. My goodness delicious. Having never made bread before. Thank you. And I don’t usually leave comment either. Hope you feel better and again thank
Marye
This makes me so happy!!
Sheri
Is there a different outcome if you use bread dough flour instead of all purpose flour.
Marye Audet
Yes - but it's marginal. Bread flour has more protein so the cinnamon rolls will be slightly less tender.
Sheri
Thank you for the great recipe, Marye.
Ours are just rising in the oven...there is NO WAY these are gonna make it into the fridge to rise, lol! My kitchen helpers rebelled at the very suggestion :-).
shelby
I totally agree, cinnamon rolls like this say I love you in many different ways! I also LOVE the pecans. I use them all the time too and I'm not from Texas. lol
Sherri Jo
Oh Marye! You've done it again... my diet would so be busted if I lived near you... I would have to be working out for hours a day! Yum!