Sourdough Strawberry Rolls

Soft, enriched sourdough rolls filled with fresh strawberries and strawberry jam - baked to perfection and topped with decadent vanilla cream cheese frosting. These sourdough strawberry rolls are going to impress your tastebuds!

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword Sourdough Recipes

Prep Time 1

Cook Time 25

Fermentation Time 12

Total Time 13 25

Servings Rolls

Calories 440kcal

Equipment

Stand Mixer
Rolling Pin
Cast Iron Pan

Ingredients

Dough

80 g Sugar Caster/Fine Sugar
200 g Milk Warm (37C)
500 g Bread Flour
100 g Sourdough Starter Fed and bubbly
7 g Salt
1 Egg (approx. 45g)
5 g Vanilla Extract
50 g Butter Room Temp

Strawberry Filling

300 g Strawberry Jam
150 g Fresh Strawberries (diced)

Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting

125 g Cream Cheese Block - not spreadable
25 g Butter Cold
100 g Powdered Sugar
5 g Vanilla Extract
1 pinch Salt

Instructions

To make the dough

Warm the milk to around 37C. Add the warm milk and sugar to the bowl of your stand mixer and mix until the sugar has thoroughly dissolved.
You can just warm the milk in the microwave before putting into your stand mixer bowl. You just don't want cold milk in your dough as it will take forever to rise!
Now add your sourdough starter, egg, vanilla, salt and bread flour and use your stand mixer to knead into a rough dough. This shouldn't take too long (around 2 to 3 minutes). Leave the dough to rest in the stand mixer bowl for around 30 minutes.
Add the butter and knead into the dough until the dough is smooth and fairly elastic. You may need to increase the speed of your stand mixer to allow the butter to be incorporated (see notes below).
Transfer to the dough to a bowl and allow to ferment. You want the dough to rise a little (around 30%) and feel soft to the touch. This needs to happen at room temp - not in the fridge.
Once the dough has finished bulk ferment, you will need to fill and shape the cinnamon rolls.

Rolling and Filling the Dough

Before you roll out the dough you need to make the filling. Add the diced strawberries to the strawberry jam and mix until well combined. Set aside while you roll out the dough.
Turn the dough out on to the counter. It shouldn't be sticky and be easy the handle. Do not use flour when rolling out the dough.
Gently roll the dough out into a rectangle. 60cm x 30cm is a good size to aim for. It doesn't have to be perfect, but the bigger you an get it, to more perfect strawberry swirls you will get.
Spread the filling all over the dough, leaving a 10cm gap on one of the long edges. You need to leave a gap so that dough will stick to itself when you roll it.
Once the filling is spread, roll the dough into a log, starting on the opposite long edge to the gap you've left.
Roll the dough into a tight log, using the unfilled dough to seal the log. You can spray a little water on the part where the dough joins if you want to - but the dough should stick to itself without it.
Lay the log out with the seam underneath.
Cut the log into approximately 10 pieces (you can measure and divide by 10 if you want them to look even - or just go freehand if you're not too fussed). As you can see in the photos, I have not measured these at all. Using dental floss to cut them will help you keep their shape and give the strawberry rolls a flat surface, however a knife is fine if you don't have any dental floss.
Place the sourdough strawberry rolls into a cast iron skillet lined with baking paper. Face all the seams inwards so that they don't unravel. If you don't have a cast iron skillet, a baking tray or casserole dish is perfectly fine. They don't have to touch as they will once the dough is puffy.

Second Rise

Cover the skillet containing the rolls with a tea towel or plastic wrap and allow the dough to rise. The dough is enriched, so it will take a little longer than normal (especially since we are dealing with sourdough).
Once the dough is puffy, you can bake them straight away - or see baking timeline above to extend the second rise and hold them in the fridge overnight.

Baking

Once the rolls are puffy and have taken up the room in the skillet, it's time to bake them. Preheat your oven to 180C/356F.
Bake rolls for 25 to 30 minutes at 180C/356F. Keep an eye on them though as they will burn easily due to the sugar.
Once they're finished baking, leave them to cool in the skillet for around 30 minutes before taking them out.
Once they're out of the oven, you can brush them with butter to give them a nice glaze. You can leave them unbuttered if you prefer. The butter will give them a nice shine.

Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting

Add cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar, vanilla and salt to your stand mixer. Beat the frosting until it's thick and glossy. Store in the fridge until ready to use.
Once the rolls have cooled a little (I leave it about 30 minutes) smother them in the vanilla cream cheese frosting. You can use a vanilla glaze or even just dust them in icing sugar if you prefer.

Notes

Adding Butter - butter is the last ingredient to add to the dough before it's left to bulk ferment. You may need to increase the speed of your mixer to get the butter to incorporate. It's best to add it in 10g increments. The dough may look greasy/slimy at first but persevere, it will incorporate if you give it enough time. The dough behaves much like brioche in this respect.

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