2 Ingredient Cinnamon Rolls with Apple Pie Filling

These decant easy apple cinnamon buns are the best breakfast, especially for a birthday or Christmas morning, a cozy fall treat, or the perfect dessert for your Rosh Hashanah dinner! We love dessert for breakfast and a delicious stress-free holiday brunch contribution, you can't go wrong with these super simple pastries! If you love sweet apple treats, you'll love Apple Pop Tarts, Apple Cider Cupcakes, and Homemade Apple Cider Marshmallows.

Ingredients and Notes

Canned Cinnamon Rolls - When selecting a can of cinnamon rolls, be sure the dough is rolled up, not sliced, so that you can unroll them. If using Pillsbury brand, be sure you're grabbing a tube of Pillsbury Grands.

Apple Pie Filling - A 21 ounce can should be enough to triple this super simple apple cinnamon rolls recipe. To use the whole can, you'll want three tubes of cinnamon rolls!

Substitutions & Variations

Canned Cinnamon Rolls - While this sweet spiced recipe calls for store-bought cinnamon rolls, homemade cinnamon roll dough will work for this delicious treat as well. You'll just add the fruit filling before you roll them up!

Apple Pie Filling - This quick and easy recipe uses canned pie filling, but you could certainly use homemade if you prefer. Other fruit fillings should also be a yummy replacement. Peach pie filling would be amazing, and even a strawberry, cherry, or blueberry pie filling could work great!

Toppings - These two-ingredient cinnamon rolls with apple pie filling can be topped with the frosting that comes with the canned cinnamon buns, but I highly recommend topping these warm, gooey treats with a brown sugar honey glaze. They can also be drizzled with honey or a caramel sauce. A cream cheese frosting would also make for a delicious addition, or even a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of a warm, gooey cinnamon bun! Chopped pecans or walnuts can also add some texture.

Casserole - Instead of individual apple cinnamon rolls, this can be made into a casserole bake by cutting up the cinnamon roll dough into 4-6 pieces per roll, placing in a baking dish, and pouring the pie filling overtop. Bake time will need to be increased for this variation.

How to Make this Recipe

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 350° F. Unroll one cinnamon bun at a time.

Step 2: Line the inside of the dough with the apple pie filling (and replace any cinnamon filling that came off the dough).

Step 3: Roll the dough back up, making sure the dough is rolling overtop of the apple pieces and is not pushing the apples out the sides.

Step 4: Place the cinnamon apple pie rolls in an ungreased pan, and bake 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Recipe FAQs

Tips & Tricks

Tip #1: Most apple pie fillings (and likely other fruit pie fillings too!) come with huge pieces of fruit. I prefer to cut the apples into smaller pieces before lining the cinnamon roll dough. It can work with the full size apples too, but they may be a bit more challenging to roll up, and the shape of your apple pie cinnamon rolls may look a little wonky - they'll still taste amazing!

Tip #2: Some cinnamon filling will probably fall off as you unroll and re-roll the dough. Use a butter knife or a clean or gloved finger to scrape the filling off your work surface and spread it back on to the dough as you roll it back up.

Tip #3: When rolling the gooey apple filling into the cinnamon roll dough, keep your hands on the sides of the dough as you roll the dough overtop of the apple pieces to help keep the apples from slipping out of the sides.

Tip #4: While the cinnamon bun is unrolled you can gently roll it with a rolling pin or press slightly with your fingers to make the dough strips thinner, wider and longer. You don't want them too thin, but rolling slightly can get you a bit more apple pie filling to cinnamon bun ratio!

Tip #5: These 2 ingredient cinnamon rolls and apple pie filling are messy to make (if you have food handling gloves, I recommend using them!), but it cleans up very easily when you're done! You can also work on a cutting board or parchment paper to make clean-up even easier.

Storage Tips

2 Ingredient Apple Cinnamon Rolls are best eaten immediately while still warm, but if leftovers need to be stored, they are best stored without topping in an airtight container at room temperature for a day or two.