Zucchini Cinnamon Rolls

If you're a zucchini bread lover, these Zucchini Cinnamon Rolls are for you! All the flavours of the quick loaf classic in a fun brunch treat. A homemade soft and lightly spiced zucchini brioche bread dough, filled with cinnamon sugar, zucchini and crushed pineapple. All topped off with a simple and classic vanilla glaze.

Jump to:

• Why you'll love these rolls
• Ingredient Notes for the Dough
• How to Make Zucchini Brioche Dough
• Expert Tips for the Dough
• Ingredient Notes for the Filling
• How to Make Zucchini Cinnamon Rolls
• Top Tips for Filling and Baking
• Frosting
• Making Ahead
• Storage Tips
• Substitutions and Variations
• FAQs
• Zucchini Cinnamon Rolls

Why you'll love these rolls

• Soft and flavorful zucchini brioche - the dough here isn't just my standard brioche cinnamon roll, instead it is lightly spiced and packed with grated zucchini!
• Sweet and tangy filling - I've recreated the flavours of my best Moist Zucchini Bread with Pineapple in these rolls. Not only do they have a classic cinnamon sugar, but also plenty of grated zucchini and crushed pineapple!
• Overnight proof - these rolls are hands off overnight, so you can get a head start on your brunch prep for the morning. Plus I include advice in this recipe for making even further in advance if you want to have a relaxing morning!

Ingredient Notes for the Dough

You'll need:

• Milk - full fat or whole milk, warmed to about 104ºF (within the range of 104º-120º works best here). Full fat milk is important for activating the yeast and achieving the best possible rolls.
• Dry active yeast - this recipe uses one standard size packet of dry active yeast (2¼ teaspoon or 7g). You can also use instant yeast here - while instant yeast doesn't technically require the same activation steps as dry active in order to work, you can still follow the recipe as written.
• Sugar - a bit of granulated sugar will help to bring the dough together and also adding a teaspoon to the warm milk helps to enliven the yeast, so that you can be sure it is working well!
• Flour - all purpose flour or plain flour.
• Bread flour - this will help to strengthen the gluten and will ensure your bread dough comes together. This recipe starts with ¾ cup of bread flour, but depending on the moisture in your zucchini and other conditions in your kitchen (heat/humidity/etc.), you may find that you need to add a few extra tablespoons to bring your dough together.
• Salt
• Ground cinnamon
• Eggs - a couple of large eggs, ideally at room temperature for adding to a dough.
• Butter - unsalted butter, softened at room temperature and cut into small pieces. You can use salted butter here, but it will add excess salt to the dough, which will impact the flavour. You can reduce the amount of added salt, but in general it is best practice to use unsalted to avoid needing to make adjustments.
• Grated zucchini - fresh grated zucchini (or courgette). I grate mine using the large side of a box grater. Once grated, pat the zucchini flakes with paper towels to remove as much excess moisture as possible.

How to Make Zucchini Brioche Dough

The fundamental processes in this dough recipe follow the steps of the dough in my classic Brioche Cinnamon Rolls, with a few changes to accommodate the zucchini.

1. Start by greasing a bowl with some butter or flavorless oil and setting this aside.
2. In a small bowl, sprinkle the yeast and a teaspoon of your sugar over top of the warmed milk. Give this a stir and set aside for about 10 minutes to allow the yeast to activate and become foamy on top.
3. Meanwhile, place the flours, remaining sugar, salt and cinnamon in a bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook. Give this a light stir.
4. Once the yeast is ready, pour this into the flour mixture, immediately followed by your eggs and about half of the zucchini. Begin kneading on a low setting until the mixture comes together into a dough.
5. Knead on a low setting for about 10 minutes and then add your butter a couple of pieces at a time, followed by the remaining zucchini.
6. Continue kneading on a low setting for a further 15 minutes.
7. At this stage, check to see if you are able to touch the dough without it leaving a lot of residue on your finger. It will be a wet and sticky dough, but it shouldn't coat your finger. If it does, add a couple of tablespoons of bread flour and continue kneading for a couple of minutes more.
8. Scrape the dough into the greased bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Proof overnight in the refrigerator (or for about 8 hours, until doubled in size).

Expert Tips for the Dough

This dough is actually quite forgiving, but there are a few key things to consider:

• Patting the zucchini with paper towels is important here as a fresh zucchini will be full of water! Don't worry about drying it out completely, but you want to try to remove as much excess as possible so that your dough doesn't become a sloppy sticky mess.
• Brioche is a wet dough, so don't be too worried if it is still sticking to the sides of the bowl as you knead it.
• If the dough seems too wet and is leaving a lot of residue on your finger when you've touched it even after all the kneading, you can add a little extra flour. Avoid adding more than ¼ cup total of extra flour as you'll end up losing out on the soft and fluffy finish!
• The time for the first proof (also known as the slow proof) doesn't need to be exact to achieve successful rolls. I've left my brioche doughs in the fridge anywhere from 6-12 hours without issue! You may notice the dough proofing quicker or more slowly depending on the settings in your fridge.

Ingredient Notes for the Filling

Like any good zucchini bread, this filling is going to be jam packed with zucchini! To make the filling you'll need:

• Butter - unsalted butter, softened at room temperature into an easily spreadable consistency. You can use salted butter here, but just like with the dough, it will add extra saltiness to the recipe. In the case of the filling this is harder to offset as there is no additional salt.
• Sugar - granulated sugar or caster sugar work best here. You can substitute with a light brown sugar, however, I find the molasses notes in brown sugars a bit more distracting from this particular cinnamon roll.
• Ground cinnamon
• Zucchini - grated zucchini (or courgette). This can be grated in the same way as for the dough. The overall recipe here uses about 1 large zucchini or 2 small ones. Just like with the dough, pat the grated zucchini dry for best results.
• Crushed pineapple - canned crushed pineapple, well drained to remove excess juice. This is technically optional, but if you like my traditional Zucchini Bread, this will give you that extra punch of tangy pineapple!

How to Make Zucchini Cinnamon Rolls

Once your dough has completed it's first proof, it's time for assembling your zucchini rolls!

1. Start by lining a square baking pan with parchment paper. Set this aside.
2. Then mix together the butter, cinnamon and sugar in a small mixing bowl. Stir these together until you have a smooth spreadable paste.
3. When your dough has finished it's first proof (image 1 below), scrape your dough out onto a floured work surface.
4. Press the dough into a rectangle and then roll it out to be about 12" wide by 15" long.
5. Spread the cinnamon butter mixture over the surface of the dough, leaving a small gap around the edges.
6. Sprinkle the grated zucchini generously over top, followed by the pineapple pieces.
7. Roll the dough from the bottom to the top into a tight log (image 2 below).
8. Using dental floss or a thin kitchen twine, trim the ends of the log, removing about an inch off each end. This will remove unfilled and uneven dough.
9. Then using the floss divide the log into nine roughly equal rolls (image 3 below), placing these in the lined pan.
10. Cover with a clean kitchen towel and allow to proof at room temperature for about 2 hours, until doubled in size (image 4 below).
11. Preheat the oven to 350ºF and bake your proofed rolls in the centre of the oven for about 25-30 minutes, until risen and golden on top.
12. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes while you prepare the topping.

Top Tips for Filling and Baking

These Zucchini Rolls are very similar to my other brioche based rolls, so if you've got experience with my other recipes, I'm sure you'll see similarities here. But, if these rolls are a new venture for you, don't worry - we've got you covered! These are some of my top tips for helping ensure these rolls come out for you.

• Lining the baking pan isn't 100% required but it sure makes life easier. Simply use two long sheets of parchment, criss crossed to create a liner. This will let you lift your entire pan's worth of rolls straight out and onto a serving plate when the time comes.
• You want to work with brioche dough while it's still cool from the fridge - this makes it easier to handle and less sticky. So, mix your spiced butter filling and dust the countertop before taking the dough out of the fridge.
• Dental floss is a game changer for cutting nice rounded rolls! Just make sure you're using flavourless floss - any minty fresh floss flavoring may add a bit of flavor to the rolls when slicing.
• The exact proofing time at room temperature will depend a lot on the conditions in your kitchen. Average, slightly cool kitchen, expect 2 hours. On a hot day, your rolls might double much more quickly (in about an hour).
• This recipe doesn't include an egg wash - this is because I use two full eggs in the dough and there isn't any leftover yolk to use up. If you want to give these an egg wash, you can make one using a yolk and some milk in the same way as my other recipes.

Frosting

The frosting here is a simple vanilla glaze. You'll want:

• Powdered sugar - or icing sugar. This doesn't need sifted for this recipe.
• Vanilla extract - or vanilla bean paste.
• Milk - the measurement here is a rough guide. You can adjust the consistency of your glaze to your preferences using more or less milk, so start off adding it slowly and sparingly until you reach the consistency preferred.

Simply mix these ingredients together in a small bowl until smooth. Then drizzle, pipe or spread over the rolls. This recipe is intended for a light coating, not a thick frosting. If you're after something thicker, try the vanilla icing from my Funfetti Cinnamon Rolls.

Making Ahead

So, firstly, as with all of my other brioche based doughs, this bread is technically make ahead as written. You'll be doing the majority of the active preparation work the day before in kneading your dough.

But, if you want to get even further ahead, you can actually opt to make the dough the morning before you intend to serve. This means that your slow refrigerator proof will take place during the day, you will assemble the rolls in the afternoon/evening and bake the evening before.

Once baked, let the rolls cool completely at room temperature. Keeping them in the pan, cover with plastic wrap. The next day, reheat for about 15 minutes in a 350ºF oven. Then follow the steps for icing and serve!

You can also keep leftovers of these rolls for a few days, though they can't be reheated as well once frosted. And, due to the pineapple in these rolls, they are prone to becoming sticky!

Storage Tips

If you are making these rolls in advance of storing leftovers, these are best kept in a cool place well wrapped.

Leftovers can be stored for a couple of days and best practice for storage will depend a bit on the frosting. If using my simple glaze here, you should be fine keeping on a countertop as long as well wrapped and not hot weather.

If you use a cream cheese or heavy cream based frosting, or if it is hot/humid in your kitchen, it is best to store in the refrigerator. In the refrigerator, these will still need to be well wrapped or in an airtight container. Leftovers should be removed from the fridge 10-15 minutes before serving to let them return to a room temperature. This will improve the flavour.

Substitutions and Variations

• Pineapple or no pineapple - the crushed pineapple in this recipe is entirely optional. You can leave it out and bake as directed. You may find that the recipe cooks a bit more quickly without the pineapple as the crushed adds moisture to the rolls.
• Add nuts - if you want to get a little extra flavour and texture in these rolls, you can easily add in some chopped nuts. Zucchini cinnamon rolls with walnuts is a particularly good combination, easily achieved by adding a handful of roughly chopped nuts to the filling before rolling up.
• Cream cheese frosting - I know a lot of people will think that a cinnamon roll isn't a cinnamon roll without cream cheese frosting! If that's the case, have no fear, you can easily make these Zucchini Rolls with cream cheese icing. Use my quick recipe from my Strawberry Cinnamon Rolls.

FAQs

Looking for more fun and fresh seasonal rolls? Try these:

• Peach Cinnamon Rolls
• Blueberry Cinnamon Rolls
• Plum Cinnamon Rolls
• Orange Cinnamon Rolls
• Cranberry Cinnamon Rolls