Easy Vegan Air Fryer Cinnamon Rolls

Most people don't think of desserts when they get an air fryer but these easy vegan air fryer cinnamon rolls might change the way you look at air fryers and cinnamon rolls forever!

If you follow us on Instagram you know we recently bought the Ninja Foodie 9 in 1 food dehydrator, air fryer, instant pot, etc. If you don't follow us on Instagram you should! I have remained skeptical of both instant pots and air fryers since I first heard of them 2 years ago!

My good friend Candice who runs The Edgy Veg even gifted me one 2 years ago to try and get me to into them. That air fryer is still at my parent's house in Niagara... sorry Candice! I just could not make anything taste good in those things!

Fast forward two years and I was still skeptical BUT I now run a food blog so I thought it was time to invest in an instant pot and air fryer again to figure it out and deliver all of you delicious and simple recipes! After all these appliances are marketed as a single pot, healthier and easier alternatives to mainstream cooking appliances, so I wanted to learn for you!

Well, I'll be a monkey's behind if I slandered these glorious machines for so long! To anyone I may have misled with my patently false claims about instant pots or air fryers, I'm sorry.

This absolute unit of a machine is life-changing. I've now cooked 10 straight meals in it including; dehydrated sweet potatoes for the dogs, french fries, air fried pickles, and now air-fried cinnamon rolls to name a few.

Seriously look into it if you haven't and if you have, make sure you're doing all the techniques properly because it does require a lot of different methods to prepare the foods than normal methods.

Okay, I've spent far too much time talking about my new UFO appliance, so let's talk about today's recipe, easy vegan air fryer cinnamon rolls!

Why Air Fryer vs Oven

So a lot of people are probably thinking what's the difference between making these in the Air Fryer and making them in the Oven.

The first and most glaring difference I've found is the time it takes to cook. With the air fryer the recipe only take 17 minutes but in the oven the same exact recipe is 25-30 minutes depending on the oven.

We've also found them to be much softer on the inside when we make them in the Air Fryer as opposed to the oven. No burnt or hard edges, it's like every piece is a middle piece!

Now I have included the instructions for how to bake it in the oven so not to worry if you don't have an Air Fryer just yet, but seriously consider investing in one because they are magical!

Nutrition Of Vegan Air Fryer Cinnamon Rolls

Alright, I'm not even going to try and icing coat this (hehe) but these are not healthy. I'm not going to try and play them up like they have some sort of nutritional value because realistically any nutritional value they may have is completely negated by the other junk in it.

The silver lining is they're significantly better than any store-bought rolls you're gonna buy. Here's the thing though sometimes you need to just treat yourself and enjoy all life has to offer!

I'll be making a healthier version of these in the future so we can all enjoy guilt-free but these are delicious so I wanted you to have these first!

The nutrition information presented here is for all of the ingredients. I take all of the nutritional information from Cronometer a nutritional tracker website that provides you with a lot of great information, especially regarding micronutrients!

Like I said it's not even really worth going into a crazy amount of detail here regarding the nutrition or lack thereof in these vegan air fryer cinnamon rolls. But also like I said before these aren't like the store-bought kind that is full of preservatives and other chemicals. I'm a huge proponent to eating as close to whole foods as possible. So if you're going to eat junk at least make it as close to whole food junk as possible!

How-To Make Vegan Air Fryer Cinnamon Rolls

This is a pretty involved process. We're making these bad boys from scratch! The whole thing! The dough, the filling, and the icing! If you're short on time feel free to sub out one of them for a store-bought substitute, but homemade is always better! In the next section, I'll talk about possible substitutions and modifications so check that out first if you want to sub something!

The first thing we're going to start with is the dough because that's the base of the whole thing!

The dough

1. Combine flour, sugar, yeast, cinnamon, and salt in a big mixing bowl.
2. In a separate bowl combine warm water, oil, and vanilla, then add to flour mixture.
3. Use a spatula to gently mix until a sticky ball is formed.
4. On a generously floured surface knead the dough well until it is light and fluffy. Adding more flour as you knead so it doesn't stick to your fingers.
5. Once the ball is no longer sticky and has been kneaded well. Cover with a tea towel for 10 minutes and let rise.

Next we're going to make the filling to spread on the dough!

The filling

1. While you're letting the dough rise, in a separate bowl combine melted vegan butter, cinnamon, white sugar, and brown sugar.

On to preparing the rolls for take off!

The rolls

1. Once the dough has risen roll out into a large rectangular shape (try to get as close to a rectangle as possible), about 16 in by 12 in.
2. Use a spatula to spread the filling you just made across the surface of the dough, leaving about ¼ inch from the edges.
3. Starting from one of the long edges roll the dough, away from yourself.
4. Using a sharp knife, cut the dough into about 1 ½ inch rolls. The dough makes about 12 using this method but can make more or less depending on how big or small you cut them.
5. Place the freshly cut buns into the air fryer pot and cover with saran wrap for 30 min to let rise.
6. After 30 min remove the saran wrap, close the lid and turn air fryer on to 320° for 17 min.

While you wait for the rolls to finish in the air fryer we can prepare the frosting!

The frosting

1. In a bowl combine icing sugar, plant milk, melted vegan butter, and vanilla. You can use a hand mixer or whisk for this (see substitution section on the difference between the two methods).

Putting it all together!

1. Once the rolls are done in the air fryer remove them and put them on a plate. Cover in icing!

Rolls are best served warm with a nice oat latte or cup of soy milk.

Substitutions

There are so many different ways to make cinnamon rolls and I totally get that!

If you're in a time crunch or you just don't feel like making the dough from scratch because it is a process, you can buy store-bought dough, but please don't expect the same results and you will almost most certainly have to adjust the time and temperature settings. If there are instructions on the package follow those, but I haven't tested this method because almost all store-bought doughs in Winnipeg aren't vegan.

For the frosting, for best results use a hand mixer this will make the frosting extra thick and creamy. You can use a whisk as well but it won't get as thick. If you like it more liquidy than thick add an extra tablespoon of plant milk.

I use soy milk throughout the recipe but you can substitute the soy milk for oat milk or almond milk if you want. I find that soy milk makes things thicker than other plant milks so just use slightly less if you're substituting soy milk!

I haven't tried this recipe with any other flours other than the one we used but if someone does I'd love to hear from you on how it turned out so I can update this section!

I have basically one of the biggest Air Fryers that you can get. It's an 8 quart so I was able to fit all 12 rolls in the pot no problem on the first go. If you have a smaller Air Fryer than you may need to break them up into two batches.

If you're using an oven to cook these put them in at 350 degrees for 25 min. Every oven cooks slightly different so just watch them around the 20 min mark and adjust the time from there.

Air Fryer Cinnamon Rolls Questions

How long do they keep?

Honestly, the answer to this is we're not entirely sure. We have a pretty good guess but these have never lasted more than 2 days in our house. I would say 5 days if you didn't refrigerate them a little longer if you did.

How do you reheat cinnamon rolls in an air fryer?

Yes, cinnamon rolls can be reheated in an air fryer at 350 degrees for 2 minutes. They can also be reheated for 15 seconds in the microwave or 1-2 min in the oven set on broil.

Are these cinnamon rolls dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free?

This cinnamon roll recipe is dairy-free, nut-free, and egg-free! It does have soy, wheat/gluten, and oil though so if you're avoiding those this recipe may not be for you, sorry! See the Substitution section to see some more ways to avoid other allergens!

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Other breakfast recipes you might like:

• Peanut butter and homemade jelly oatmeal
• Healthy strawberry, banana, chocolate oatmeal
• Easy Protein Porridge

If you try this recipe I’d love to hear from you! You can rate it, comment about it, sending me pictures about it, I don’t care how but I want to hear from you and see how you enjoyed it!

Kitchen equipment I used:

• The 9-1 absolute unit Air Fryer, Instant Pot, Dehydrator - I was actually very anti-Instant-pot/Air fryer for a long time and bought a couple in the past and could never get them to work or make any of the food taste good. This spaceship of an appliance changed everything! I make everything in it now! Desserts, Dinners, Dog Treats, you name it and I can make it in this beast. Highly recommend!
• 5 tier dehydrator stand for Ninja Foodie - The Foodie comes with a lot accessories but we opted to get this one as well because we want to use the dehydrator a lot (especially for dog treats) so it made sense! It doesn't have great reviews, most people complain about it coming slightly bent, which mine did too, but it works perfectly and is super vital to dehydrating a lot of treats at once. The slight bend in the metal doesn't affect the product at all.
• Foodie Silicon grip mitts - Okay these things are sweet! They're ridged so it's easier to grip the pots and accessories and no heat gets through them so you can hold on and mix the hot pot really easily! Plus they look hilarious and the dogs love when I put them on! Plus plus they're super cheap!