Homestead on Lakeside

Two Augusts ago, we visited my parents in North Carolina and went to the most idyllic, beautiful apple farm in the mountains. I love going to local u-pick farms in Florida, but we don’t have apple farms here, so this was a new and exciting adventure picking apples together as a family. The apples at this farm were the biggest and most delicious apples I’ve ever had. On this farm, they also had u-pick grapes. We picked concord grapes and made grape juice and jam after we arrived back home in Florida.

Unfortunately, I don’t have the delicious apples from North Carolina, but I’m inspired during this time of year with the late summer and the coming fall to make all of the apple desserts. I used my blueberry lemon sourdough sweet rolls recipe and adapted it to make these warm and fall inspired sourdough apple cinnamon rolls.

Sourdough Apple Cinnamon Rolls Ingredients

The Dough

• 4 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup of sourdough starter (If you are new to sourdough, see my post here on how to make your own sourdough starter.  Or you can borrow some from a neighbor!)
• 1 cup of milk (1/2 cup to mix into dough and 1/2 cup to soak rolls in)
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup of maple sugar or regular sugar
• 1 tsp of baking powder
• 1 stick of butter melted
• 1/2 tsp of salt

The Filling

• 10 ounces of no added sugar apple sauce (1 1/4 cups)
• 2 tbsp of butter
• 1 tsp vanilla (check out my post here on how to make your own vanilla)
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tbsp of flour (I like to use Einkorn flour for anything that won’t be fermenting)
• 1 large apple chopped in small cubes
• 1/2 cup of maple sugar or brown sugar

Glaze Topping

• 2 cups of powdered sugar
• 3 to 4 tbsp of water
• 1 tsp of vanilla

Sourdough Apple Cinnamon Rolls Recipe

The Night Before

Start the night before by mixing the ingredients for the dough. Melt the butter in a small sauce pan. Mix the flour, starter, sugar, milk, egg, baking powder, butter, and salt.

While the dough is mixing with the dough hook in the Kitchen-Aid mixer, the consistency of the sourdough apple cinnamon rolls is a firm dough that is not sticky. After the dough comes together in a ball, it will sit overnight until I’m ready to make the cinnamon rolls. In this case, I mixed the dough around 11pm and put the remaining ingredients in the rolls around 2pm the next day. The dough is very flexible. I have made these rolls after an 8 hour fermentation or have waited as long as 15 hours.

Cover the dough in a bowl and allow it to sit on the counter overnight.

The Next Day

Begin making the apple cinnamon sauce for the filling. In a small sauce pan, add the butter, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, cubed apples, apple sauce, and flour. Heat the apple cinnamon mixture, stirring often, until the apples, sugar, and flour have thickened and become fully incorporated.  There will be softened cubes of apples in the sauce.

Lightly flour the counter and roll out the dough into a rectangular shape, measuring about 18 inches by 10 inches.

Spread the apple cinnamon sauce mixture evenly over the dough.

Roll the dough starting at the long side of the dough. As you are rolling,  try to keep as much of the filling in between the layers of the rolls. If any filling seeps out, place it evenly on top of the rolls in the pan.

Then, cut the rolls using an unwaxed and unscented floss. I like silk floss. Start by cutting the rolls in half. Then, each half will be cut in half until you have 16 cut rolls.

Place the cut rolls in a 9×13 pan and top evenly with the remaining 1/2 cup of milk. Cover the allow to rise in a warm place for about an hour.

Preheat the oven to 350F.  I like to place the rolls on the back of the stove top so that as the oven is preheating, the rolls are in a warm spot to rise.

Bake the rolls for 30 minutes or until the tops of the rolls are lightly brown and the middle rolls don’t appear soggy.

While the rolls are baking, prepare the glaze topping.

Mix the vanilla, water, and powdered sugar together well so there are no lumps from the sugar and set aside. If the glaze is too watery, add a tsp of powdered sugar until desired thickness is achieved.  If the glaze is too thick, add just a few drops of water until the desired thickness is achieved.

After removing the cinnamon rolls from the oven, allow them to cool for 5 minutes before topping with the glaze. Then, evenly pour the glaze over the cinnamon rolls. Allow the sourdough apple cinnamon rolls to cool for another 5 minutes, then serve.

I hope you enjoy these sourdough apple cinnamon rolls as much as we do!

For more homemade family inspiration and recipes follow along @homesteadonlakeside

This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Thanks for your support!