Cranberry Cinnamon Rolls

These easy upside-down cranberry cinnamon rolls include flaky cinnamon rolls topped with a caramelized brown sugar glaze, dried cranberries, and chopped pecans.

Y’all, there are some awesome recipes on the internet! And I want you to know that I greatly appreciate you coming to Southern Plate time and again. My goal is to share recipes that I love and feed my own family in hopes of inspiring you and making it a little easier to gather around the table with your family.

Today I’m sharing my version of a recipe that I found on Pillsbury’s website. As much as I love making homemade cinnamon rolls (especially my easy stuffed cinnamon rolls), I use these little canned flaky cinnamon rolls on a regular basis. I generally make them as a quick dessert in the evenings with coffee. If you’ve been serving them as breakfast only, you’re missing out!

Anyway, today I’m sharing my version of this cranberry orange cinnamon roll recipe. I’m using plain cinnamon rolls with buttercream icing, but feel free to use Pillsbury’s orange rolls with orange icing instead, which is what they use in the recipe. To be honest, they’re my favorite, but any type of cinnamon sweet roll works.

Quick, easy, and low-fuss cinnamon rolls

This is a quick, easy, and great low-fuss holiday dish. Instead of using a cranberry filling made with jarred cranberry sauce, homemade cranberry sauce, or leftover cranberry sauce, we’re opting for dried cranberries sprinkled on top of our cranberry sweet rolls instead.

All you need to do is combine the brown sugar and melted butter in the bottom of a cake pan to make our caramelized glaze. Then we scatter dried cranberries and chopped pecans on top before adding the cinnamon rolls. All that’s left to do is bake the cinnamon rolls before turning them upside down so all that delicious flavor is on top of the flaky cinnamon rolls. Add the icing and you have yourself the most delicious cranberry cinnamon buns imaginable.

By the way… this post is in no way sponsored by Pillsbury, but I did request and receive permission from them to share this recipe on SouthernPlate. 

Recipe Ingredients

• Canned cinnamon rolls
• Dried cranberries
• Dark or light brown sugar
• Chopped pecans
• Melted butter 

How to Make Cranberry Cinnamon Rolls

Stir together melted butter and brown sugar.

Spread this over the bottom of a nonstick 9-inch round cake pan.

You don’t have to grease it because of the butter, but it does need to be nonstick. 

Sprinkle with dried cranberries and nuts. 

Open the rolls and arrange the dough in the pan.

Bake at 375 for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown on top.

Oh goodness, get ready for some prettiness!

Remove them from the oven and turn them upside down onto a large serving plate. Do not remove them from the baking dish!

Let the pan sit for five minutes before removing the cranberry cinnamon rolls from the inverted pan.

If the icing is in a packet, snip the end off of it and drizzle it over the warm cranberry sweet rolls.

If it is in a little tub, spoon it into a ziplock bag, seal it, and snip off the corner to drizzle over the rolls. 

Serve warm.

Storage

• Store leftover cranberry cinnamon buns in an airtight container or covered in plastic wrap at room temperature for up to 2 days or in the fridge for up to 1 week. I recommend quickly reheating them in the air fryer or oven.
• Visit this recipe for freezing instructions, as there’s a trick to freezing cinnamon rolls.

Recipe Notes

• Instead of kneading the bag of icing until warm, you can also microwave it on medium (50%) for 5 to 10 seconds or until thin enough to drizzle. 
• Check out this recipe for homemade cream cheese frosting instead.
• In the Pillsbury recipe, they add 2 tablespoons of honey and 2 teaspoons of orange juice to the brown sugar glaze to enhance the orange flavor. If you want to do this and you’re using orange rolls, go right on ahead! Cranberry orange sweet rolls are a delight!
• If you’re using fresh orange juice, add some freshly grated orange zest too to really embrace that zesty citrus flavor.
• Feel free to substitute the pecans for chopped walnuts or omit them completely if there’s a nut allergy.
• On the other hand, feel free to substitute the dried cranberries for dried cherries, raisins, or golden raisins.

Check out these other cinnamon-spiced treats:

Cinnamon Twists

Stuffed Cinnamon Toast Sticks

Easy Homemade Cinnamon Rolls

Easy Stuffed Cinnamon Rolls (With Cream Cheese Icing)

Cinnamon Roll French Toast Bake

Pumpkin Spice Cinnamon Rolls

The original recipe for cranberry orange sweet rolls that inspired this one can be found here.

If everyone is thinking alike then someone isn’t thinking. 

~General George Patton