I must tell you – these are fantastic! I have adapted this from Jeanine at The Baking Beauties sweet roll recipe. I wanted a special Easter breakfast, and I didn’t feel like cinnamon buns – so the cherry cheese Danish was born! I found a Danish recipe using packaged crescent rolls – that called for putting a layer of dough in the bottom of a pan, topping with the filling ingredients, and then topping with the remaining dough. I was going to give this a try, using Jeanine’s dough – but I decided to see what the dough would be like once I mixed it up, if I would be able to make individual rolls, and it turns out that I could. The recipe may seem a little long and daunting, but they are actually pretty easy to make.
Gluten-Free Cherry Cheese Danish
You could of course use any type of pie filling instead of cherry.
Ingredients
- 335 grams 2 1/2 cups brown rice flour
- 178 g 1 1/4 cups tapioca starch/flour
- 135 g 3/4 cup potato starch (NOT flour)
- 1 package 4 serving size vanilla instant Jello pudding mix
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 tablespoon rapid rise yeast
- 1 tablespoon xanthan gum
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup water
- 6 tablespoons butter
- 1 cup milk
- 2 large eggs room temperature
- 3 tablespoons canola oil
- 1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Filling:
- 2/3 cup spreadable cream cheese
- 3 tablespoons sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 can cherry pie filling I used E.D. Smith Light & Fruity
Glaze:
- 1 cup icing confectioners' sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 3-4 tablespoons milk or cream
Instructions
- Place a pan of warm water in the bottom of your oven (I used an 8 inch square cake pan with about an inch of water) and preheat oven to 170 degrees F. When the oven reaches the temperature turn it off.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer, combine the brown rice flour, tapioca starch, potato starch, pudding mix, sugar, yeast, xanthan gum, baking powder and salt. Mix on low to combine.
- Place water and butter in a microwave safe bowl or large measuring cup and microwave on high for 1 minute, or until the butter has melted.
- Add the milk, eggs, canola oil, vinegar and vanilla. Whisk to combine.
- While the mixer is running on low, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry. If the dough seems too dry you can add a bit more milk.
- Let the mixer run on medium speed for 5 minutes until well blended and smooth.
Filling:
- While the dough is mixing, prepare the filling by stirring the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla together until smooth.
Making the rolls:
- Prepare pans by lining with parchment paper (I used a 10x15" cookie sheet/jelly roll pan and a small 6x8" pan - if you have a larger pan you may be able to fit all in one pan).
- Scoop out blobs of dough onto the parchment lined pan. (I used a 1/3 cup scoop - like an ice cream scoop - sprayed with cooking spray to scoop out the dough in even sized bits. This made 10 large rolls.)
- Wet your hands and flatten the dough down with your palm. Make a well in the center of each roll. (I used the back of my scoop, sprayed with cooking spray, to make an indentation).
- Place about 2 teaspoons of cream cheese filling in each indentation, and top with a good spoonful of cherry pie filling (I had a bit of pie filling left over).
- Open the oven and quickly place the pans inside (so the heat doesn't escape). Turn the oven light on for a bit more heat. Allow to rise for about 1/2 hour.
- When the rolls are nicely risen, remove the pans from the oven, and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 25 to 35 minutes, until they are lightly browned.
- Remove from oven and allow to cool for about 15 minutes.
- Meanwhile, make the glaze by combining the icing sugar and vanilla in a small bowl. Gradually add enough milk or cream to make a thin glaze.
- Drizzle glaze over rolls, and enjoy.
Notes
These can be frozen and reheated in the microwave. I like to store the glaze in the fridge and drizzle the glaze over them once reheated - otherwise the glaze "cooks" before the roll is as warm as I would like it when reheating.
Fresh out of the oven (not glazed yet)
Ready to enjoy!
Oh – those do look GOOD!! Now that is good use of the dough recipe – I’m glad that I inspired those! 😀 Fabulous job!