Before you jump into the recipe, let’s talk about a few tips:

• The mixture of milk, butter, and yogurt should not exceed 43°C or 110°F. Between 40°C and 43°C or 100°F and 110°F is ideal. Remember, yeast is a living organism, and we don’t want to kill it.
• This recipe calls for active dry yeast and while it does not need to be proofed for it to work, I like to add this step just to make sure the yeast is still alive. In my opinion is better to find out at the beginning of the recipe rather than the end when you have already wasted ingredients and are giving yourself a headache trying to figure out what went wrong.
• The butter for the filling in this recipe is just regular unsalted butter at room temperature but I usually use browned butter for the filling as well. I didn’t do it in this recipe, but it tastes spectacular. I highly recommend you give it a try.
• You can omit the heavy cream if you prefer, but the cream will give us that gooey and soft consistency at the bottom of the pumpkin rolls. It’s all about how you enjoy the most your cinnamon rolls.
• It’s not completely necessary to skim the butter off to brown it, but it does burn faster, just be careful.
• As a recommendation, I advise you not to put cinnamon in the dough. I tried it twice and the dough came out a little bit bitter, but instead be generous with the ginger powder as it pairs beautifully with the pumpkin puree and pumpkin spice. I find it makes the pumpkin flavor stand out in a very elegant way. The recipe calls for 15 grams of ginger powder as I develop the recipe to be friendly for most palates but when I cook these rolls for my own home I go as high as 25 – 30 grams.

pumpkin Spice Cinnamon Rolls

Ingredients

For the Dough:

• 250ml whole milk
• 70g unsalted butter
• 25g Greek yogurt
• 90g granulated sugar
• 330g pumpkin puree
• 10g active dry yeast
• 640g all-purpose flour
• 12g pumpkin spice
• 4g fine salt
• 15g ginger powder
• 50g egg (1 piece)
• 125ml heavy cream

Cinnamon and Spice Filling:

• 160g brown sugar
• 113g unsalted butter (brown or unbrown)
• 15g ground cinnamon
• 1g nutmeg
• 2g fine salt
• 2g ground cloves

Cream Cheese Topping:

• 60g hazelnut/golden butter at room temperature
• 30g sifted icing sugar
• 200g cream cheese at room temperature
• 50g reduced maple syrup
• 15g Vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Prepare the Dough:
   • In a microwave-safe container, add the milk and butter along with the Greek yogurt and heat until the butter is melted. Using a kitchen thermometer, make sure the mixture has reached a temperature between 100-110°F or 37-43°C. The mixture should not exceed this temperature; doing so could kill the yeast. Remember that yeast is a living organism.
   • Take the milk, butter, and yogurt mixture to the mixer bowl. Add the granulated sugar, pumpkin puree, yeast, flour, pumpkin spice, salt, ginger powder, and egg to the mixer bowl. With the paddle attachment, mix just until a dough is formed. Once the dough is formed, switch the paddle attachment for the hook and knead for 10 minutes at medium speed (4-6 in a KitchenAid mixer) or until the dough is not sticking to the bowl.
   • Grease a large, deep container with a little oil and add the dough. Cover with film or foil and place it in a warm place to ferment for 1 hour and 30 minutes up to 2 hours, or until doubled in size.
2. Prepare the Filling:
   • While the dough is fermenting, make the filling. Place the room temperature butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, fine salt, ground cloves in the mixer bowl and cream with the paddle attachment at medium speed (4-6 Kitchen mixer Aid) for 3 -5 minutes. Set aside.
3. Prepare the Cream Cheese Topping:
   • Let’s start by browning the butter. In a pot melt the butter over low heat, never on high heat, as butter burns easily. Once it starts to melt, you will see a foam forming on the surface of the butter; With the help of a spoon remove that foam. After 3 minutes, the butter will begin to brown; Once it is amber in color, remove from the heat and transfer to a container. Do not wait for it to have an intense caramel color, as the heat that the butter already has once off the heat can burn it. Let the butter cool down until it has a spreadable consistency, either outside the refrigerator or inside.
   • Maple syrup is optional in this recipe, but in my opinion the maple syrup adds that perfect fall flavor, in my opinion. To reduce the maple syrup, pour 100 g of maple syrup into a pot and, over low heat, let it reduce by 50%. You can also do this step in the microwave.
   • In the mixer bowl add the sifted icing sugar, room temperature cream cheese and the reduced maple syrup; mix at medium speed until we have a homogeneous mixture, about 3 minutes. Set aside.
4. Punch the Dough
   • After an hour and a half has passed by and the dough has risen, punch the dough. Fold the dough and shape it into a ball, cover back again and put it in the refrigerator for 1 hour and a half to 2 hours. After hour and a half take the dough out of the refrigerator.  
5. Make Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
   • After an hour and a half has passed by and the dough has risen, punch the dough. Fold the dough and shape it into a ball, cover back again and put it in the refrigerator for 1 hour and a half to 2 hours. After hour and a half take the dough out of the refrigerator.  Flour a surface to work the dough along with a rolling pin, stretch the dough and try your best to shape it like a rectangle. Do not stress too much if you can’t the rolls will work out anyway.
   • With a spatula spread the cinnamon filling and then roll the dough into a log. Don’t roll too tight, just roll with a natural movement. Trace the thickness of the cinnamon rolls with the help of a spatula or knife. The ones in the picture were three fingers wide. Use a dental floss and cut the rolls. Transfer the rolls to a baking dish aligned with parchment paper, cover the dish with foil and place in the refrigerator overnight. If you don’t want to wait all night, let them rest for at least 2 hours in the refrigerator.
6. Bake the Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
   • Next day, preheat the oven to 350F or 180C. Meanwhile, uncover the cinnamon rolls and add the heavy cream on top of the rolls, cover with aluminum foil and bake in the oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, open the oven, remove the foil covering the baking dish and place the tray back in the oven and bake for 5 more minutes, depending on how golden you like them. I don’t suggest going over 10 minutes. Take the tray out of the oven and let cool down for 10 minutes.
7. Frost & Serve Rolls
   • Once the pumpkin rolls are warm, spread the cream cheese and maple syrup frosting and enjoy your delicious Pumpkin Spice Dough rolls with Cinnamon and Cream Cheese Topping while still warm!