These outrageously rich and indulgent chocolate sweet rolls come together with a buttery soft fresh homemade dough and brown sugar chocolate filling. They’re shaped like cinnamon rolls, but taste like flaky chocolate babka. Drizzle the warm rolls with espresso glaze or choose another topping from the suggestions below.
These make for an extra special Christmas, Mother’s Day, Easter, or Father’s Day brunch recipe!
Melty chocolate, fresh dough, and espresso glaze. What’s not to love about this trio?
Tell Me About These Chocolate Sweet Rolls
- Flavor: I often use softened butter in softer bread doughs, but opted for melted butter here. I find melted butter adds more, well, buttery flavor. This dough is sweet and so buttery—in fact, it would be fantastic completely plain. But plain’s not in our language today and we’re filling it with brown sugar, cocoa powder, a bit of cinnamon, vanilla, and lots of real chocolate. Don’t limit them to the morning hours because these chocolate sweet rolls definitely taste like dessert.
- Texture: Because there’s fat in the dough from the whole milk, eggs, and butter, the bread is extra soft, rich, and flaky. Though all-purpose flour is fine, bread flour promises extra bread-like chewiness. These textures work perfectly with the gooey chocolate swirls and smooth espresso glaze. Each bite has different twists, flakes, and pockets of melty chocolate—similar to the texture of apple cinnamon babka. They’re like warm chocolate babka rolls.
- Ease: It goes without saying that homemade bread takes time and effort. Consider these chocolate sweet rolls a fun afternoon or weekend baking project. The dough requires 2 rises, but otherwise is pretty straightforward. You can even get started the night before by following the overnight instructions. If you’re new to baking with yeast, review our Baking with Yeast Guide. Or if you’re in a real time crunch, try these super quick 20 minute chocolate crescents instead.
Use a Rich Dough for Chocolate Rolls
Before I show you how to make chocolate rolls, let’s talk about the dough. This is a rich dough, which means that it’s prepared with fat like milk, butter, and eggs. Rich doughs make soft breads such as dinner rolls, pull apart bread, and glazed doughnuts. Lean doughs, on the other hand, are made without much fat and produce crusty bread like homemade bagels, artisan bread, and pizza dough. There are so many ways to bake bread and if you want to expand your bread skills, here are all of our yeast bread recipes. (This cheese bread is a reader and team favorite!)
- Instant Yeast or Active-Dry? You can use instant yeast or active-dry yeast in the chocolate rolls. I usually use instant yeast and still take the time to quickly proof the yeast in step 1. Proofing the yeast means mixing it with a little sugar and the warm liquid to prove that it’s active—the mixture will look foamy on top, see photo below. But this step is not usually required when using instant yeast. Still, it doesn’t hurt and takes 5 minutes and you can prep your other dough ingredients as you wait.
This rich dough is supposed to be very soft, so don’t add more flour than absolutely needed. Embrace the softness and a sticky work surface because if you don’t mind the mess, you’ll be rewarded with the richest, flakiest chocolate rolls. I heard chocolate croissants were borderline jealous of all these flakes.
Do These Taste Like Cinnamon Rolls?
As far as the process goes, we’re essentially making homemade cinnamon rolls but with a chocolate filling. Make the dough, let it rise, punch it down, roll it out, add the chocolate filling, roll up jelly roll style, cut into rolls, let them rise until puffy, then bake. If you’ve made homemade cinnamon rolls before, this process isn’t anything new. We do use cinnamon in the filling, but it’s really just a background flavor behind all the chocolate and brown sugar. They certainly resemble cinnamon rolls, but they taste like homemade bread swirled with gooey melted chocolate.
Step-By-Step Photos
Proofing the yeast:
After the dough comes together, knead by hand or with your stand mixer. (See my How to Knead Dough tutorial for extra help with this step.) The dough is now ready to rise. Here is the soft dough before and after the 1st rise:
Here are the rolls before and after the 2nd rise. See how puffy they get?
I don’t want to stand in your way of chocolate bliss, so I promise I’m almost done. 😉
Espresso Glaze & Other Topping Options
I couldn’t decide on a topping that would be legendary enough for these extraordinary rolls, but espresso glaze comes pretty close. The bitter espresso powder helps offset the sweet confectioners’ sugar and all the sweetness in the rolls themselves. It would taste divine on these no yeast cinnamon rolls too!
Other topping options include salted caramel, vanilla icing, the maple icing from maple bacon doughnuts, or cream cheese icing from homemade cinnamon rolls or raspberry sweet rolls. For something simple, a light dusting of confectioners’ sugar would be beautiful. Peanut butter frosting would be over-the-top and I’m certain all your sweet teeth would be satisfied for weeks. Ha!
And, again, these rolls are RICH so you could easily skip the icing on top.
See Your Chocolate Sweet Rolls!
Many readers tried this recipe as part of a baking challenge! Feel free to email or share your recipe photos with us on social media. 🙂
More Cinnamon Roll Varieties:
- Cinnamon Rolls
- Apple Cinnamon Rolls
- Raspberry Sweet Rolls (my favorite!!)
- Overnight Cinnamon Rolls
- Maple Pecan Sticky Buns
- Lemon Sweet Rolls
- Orange Sweet Rolls
- Birthday Cake Cinnamon Rolls
- Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls
Chocolate Sweet Rolls
- Prep Time: 1 hour
- Cook Time: 28 minutes
- Total Time: 4 hours, 30 minutes (includes rise times)
- Yield: 12 rolls
- Category: Breakfast
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These rich and fluffy chocolate sweet rolls come together with a buttery soft fresh homemade dough and brown sugar chocolate filling. They’re shaped like cinnamon rolls, but taste like flaky chocolate babka. You can make the chocolate rolls within a few hours or get started the night before using the overnight preparation option.
Ingredients
- 1 cup (240ml) whole milk, warmed to about 100°F (38°C)
- 6 Tablespoons (75g) granulated sugar, divided
- 1 Tablespoon (9g) active dry or instant yeast
- 5 Tablespoons (71g) unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 4 cups (530g) bread flour (spooned & leveled), plus more as needed for hands/work surface
Chocolate Filling
- 6 Tablespoons (85g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 2 Tablespoons (10g) unsweetened natural or dutch process cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup (135g) semi-sweet chocolate chips or a 4 ounce semi-sweet chocolate bar, finely chopped*
Espresso Icing
- 3 Tablespoons (45ml) heavy cream*
- 1 teaspoon espresso powder*
- 1 and 1/2 cups (180g) confectioners’ sugar, sifted (sift after measuring)
- 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Instructions
- Prepare the dough: Whisk the warm milk, 2 Tablespoons sugar, and the yeast together in the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with a dough hook or paddle attachment. Cover and allow mixture to sit for about 5 minutes or until foamy on top. *If you do not own a mixer, you can do this in a large mixing bowl and in the next step, mix the dough together with a large wooden spoon/silicone spatula. It will take a bit of arm muscle. A hand mixer works, but the sticky dough repeatedly gets stuck in the beaters. Mixing by hand with a wooden spoon or silicone spatula is a better choice.*
- Add the remaining sugar, the butter, eggs, salt, and 1 cup (about 130g) of flour and beat on medium speed for 1 minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Add 3 cups (about 400g) flour, switch the mixer down to low speed, and beat until a soft dough forms and pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Dough will be very soft, but not overly sticky. Beat in 2-3 more Tablespoons of flour if dough seems very sticky. Avoid adding more flour than you need.
- Knead the dough: Keep the dough in the mixer (and switch to the dough hook if using the paddle) and beat for an additional 6-8 full minutes, or knead by hand on a lightly floured surface for 6-8 full minutes. (If you’re new to bread-baking, my How to Knead Dough video tutorial can help here.) If the dough becomes too sticky during the kneading process, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of flour at a time on the dough or on the work surface/in the bowl to make a soft, slightly tacky dough. Do not add more flour than you need because you do not want a dry dough. After kneading, the dough should still feel a little soft. Poke it with your finger—if it slowly bounces back, your dough is ready to rise. You can also do a “windowpane test” to see if your dough has been kneaded long enough: tear off a small (roughly golfball-size) piece of dough and gently stretch it out until it’s thin enough for light to pass through it. Hold it up to a window or light. Does light pass through the stretched dough without the dough tearing first? If so, your dough has been kneaded long enough and is ready to rise. If not, keep kneading until it passes the windowpane test.
- 1st Rise: Lightly grease a large bowl with oil or use nonstick spray. Place the dough in the bowl, turning it to coat all sides in the oil. Cover the bowl with aluminum foil, plastic wrap, or a clean kitchen towel. Allow the dough to rise in a relatively warm environment for 2 hours or until double in size. (I always let it rise on the counter and it takes about 2 hours. For a tiny reduction in rise time, see my answer to Where Should Dough Rise? in my Baking with Yeast Guide.)
- Grease the bottom and sides of a metal or glass 9×13-inch baking dish or line with parchment paper.
- Roll out the dough: Punch down the dough to release the air. Place dough on a lightly floured work surface and using a lightly floured rolling pin, roll dough into a 10×16-inch rectangle. Make sure the dough is smooth and evenly thick. If the dough keeps shrinking as you roll it out, stop what you’re doing, cover it lightly, and let it rest for 10 minutes to relax the gluten. When you return to the dough, it should stretch out much easier.
- For the filling: Mix all of the filling ingredients together except for the chopped chocolate/chocolate chips. The softer the butter is, the easier it is to mix. (Microwave it for a few seconds to soften if needed.) Spread mixture all over the dough. Sprinkle chopped chocolate/chocolate chips evenly on top. Tightly roll up the dough to form a 16-inch-long log. If some filling spills out, sprinkle it on top of the roll. With an extra sharp knife, cut into 12 even rolls, between 1-1.5 inches each. Arrange in the prepared baking pan.
- 2nd Rise: Cover the rolls tightly and allow to rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour. (Or use the overnight option below.)
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Bake rolls for about 25-28 minutes or until they are lightly browned on top. After about 15 minutes, tent a piece of aluminum foil over the top of the pan to prevent the tops from browning too quickly and baking unevenly. Remove pan from the oven and place pan on a wire rack for about 10 minutes as you make the icing.
- Make the icing: Warm the cream on the stove until barely simmering or warm it in the microwave for 15-30 seconds. Whisk espresso powder into the warm cream, then whisk in the confectioners’ sugar and vanilla extract until combined. Drizzle the icing over the warm rolls and serve immediately.
- Cover leftover frosted or unfrosted rolls tightly and store at room temperature for up to 2 days or in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions – Overnight: To prepare the night before serving, prepare the rolls through step 7. Cover the rolls tightly and refrigerate for 8-12 hours. (16 hours max. 8-12 hours is best, but 16 hours is OK if absolutely needed. Do not exceed 16 hours.) The next morning, remove from the refrigerator and allow to rise on the counter for 1-2 hours before continuing with step 9.
- Make Ahead Instructions – Freezing: Baked rolls can be frozen up to 2-3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and warm up before enjoying. You can also freeze the unbaked rolls and here’s how: bake the rolls in step 9 for only about 10 minutes. Cool completely, then cover tightly and freeze. To serve, take the rolls out of the freezer and place in the refrigerator overnight to thaw. Once thawed, finish baking them for about 20 minutes.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Stand Mixer (or Glass Mixing Bowl with Wooden Spoon/Silicone Spatula) | 9×13-inch Baking Pan | Rolling Pin | Cooling Rack
- Milk: Use whole milk for the best, richest tasting dough. You could also use buttermilk. 2%, 1%, or nondairy milk work in a pinch. Do not use nonfat milk.
- Yeast: Make sure you use 1 Tablespoon of yeast, which is a little more than 1 standard packet. You can use active dry or instant yeast in this recipe. Follow all of the same instructions. If using active dry yeast, the rise times are usually *slightly* longer, but not much. Reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.
- Best Flour to Use: For best texture, I recommend bread flour. The same amount of all-purpose flour works and the rolls will still be wonderfully rich and soft. The rolls are a little more chewy and flaky when using bread flour.
- Chocolate: I usually use and recommend one 4 ounce (113g) baking chocolate bar, such as Ghirardelli or Bakers 4 ounce bars sold in the baking aisle. Chopped fine, this is about 3/4 cup. You can use semi-sweet or bittersweet. Avoid white chocolate or milk chocolate because the rolls will be overly sweet. You can use about 3/4 cup of chocolate chips, mini or regular size, instead. Chocolate chips weigh a little more, so use 135g if you are using a scale.
- Heavy Cream & Espresso Powder: In first part of the icing recipe, we are essentially making a creamy and very strong espresso liquid by mixing warm cream with espresso powder. (Make sure you use instant espresso powder, which is typically sold as simply “espresso powder.”) Feel free to use 3 Tablespoons of very strong brewed espresso or black coffee instead. Mix icing ingredients together, then add 1 more Tablespoon brewed espresso or black coffee to thin out if needed/desired.
- Half Batch: You can halve this recipe by halving all of the ingredients and using an 8 or 9 inch square or round pan. The 1st dough rise time may be a bit shorter. Roll the dough out to (approximately) a 7×10 inch rectangle. Roll up into a 10 inch log, then cut into 6 rolls. 2nd dough rise time will be about the same. Bake time is a few minutes shorter.
These were delicious and the dough was so easy to handle. I made half the batch the night before Mother’s Day for sampling, and par-baked the other half. The make ahead instructions are to par bake, freeze, and thaw – since it was the night before I skipped the freezing and just cooled and placed in refrigerator. They were still very good except one that was stuck in the middle got pretty crowded as the others seemed to continue to rise and it flattened a bit. Next time I will stick to the instructions, anyway, everyone still loved them. I just used powdered sugar instead of icing and they were very pretty.
These are delicious, i had to use all of my willpower not to eat them all. Really easy recipe to follow too!
These came out awesome! I did a vanilla icing and used all-purpose flour but they still came out great. My Mom keeps raving to everyone how good they were so I will definitely be making them again!
I have to admit, I was a little nervous about the long rise time for these, since my go-to cinnamon roll recipe rises in half the time. It was a pointless worry, though, because they turned out perfectly, and the texture of the rolls was spot on. I still prefer the flavor of traditional cinnamon rolls, but these were very tasty!
I made these for Mother’s Day, and they were a huge hit! My family loved them! I didn’t make the glaze, but they were perfect even without any glaze. They’re so chocolatey and delicious. I will definitely be making these again.
I have made 20+ recipes from this website and this is hands down THE BEST ONE YET. So so so beautifully butter, soft and chocolate-y. I just couldn’t get enough!
I’m a chocolate addict, and these were the perfect excuse to have chocolate at breakfast! I felt like I was working in a chocolate factory as the scent took over the kitchen as I spread the chocolate over the dough. I was amazed at how much they grew while baking! We enjoyed these with vanilla icing, but I’m eager to try different toppings.
These were delicious, the dough was easy to work with, and we loved the choice of espresso powder in the icing.
Hi! I loved making this recipe! I found one step in the icing directions confusing. The recipe calls for espresso powder, which I have and used. Then I noticed the powder did not dissolve in the heavy cream. After asking our lovely facebook group, I learned that if I want to use espresso powder (as opposed to the liquid options given), I should have used instant espresso powder. Maybe specifying that would be helpful? Thanks for another great recipe!!
Hi Erin! Thank you so much for the feedback. Instant espresso powder is typically sold as simply “espresso powder” but I can certainly add that note! So glad you enjoyed making these rolls.
This recipe is an incredible discovery! It was sooo delicious and it was perfect for Mother’s Day. So decadent!
Delicious!!! And so much fun to make!!
Made these today with vanilla icing (my daughter’s preference) and they were easy and delicious!
These just came out of the oven! I split the dough to make minis and needed a few extra minutes in the oven to get the center ones up to temperature… went with the espresso glaze and boy, are they delicious!
Scrumptious. Fun to make, and the dough was pillow soft! Half for my mom and half for my family for Mother’s day!!
Happiest of Mother’s days to you!
Hi Sally,
This sweet roll is very easy to make and very delicious.I enjoyed this with my family.Thank you so much for sharing those recipes with us.❤️
These sweet rolls were so easy to make. I did the overnight version and had a delightful Mother’s Day breakfast. I will definitely be making these again. Thanks Sally for another show stopping recipe
These are delicious! And pretty easy too. Made them a day ahead and reheated in the morning. A delightful gooey chocolatey treat!
Sally & Gang,
These were the best! We knew when we rolled out the dough they were going to be fantastic! It took no time at all to roll the dough out. The recipe was perfect. Not messing aound, just perfect. Soft, fluffy dough. Love working with this dough!
As Always, Thank you!
Cheryl
If a cinnamon roll & chocolate croissant had a baby, this would be their love child!
I made an overnight half batch of these for Mother’s Day, following the recipe exactly. They were ridiculously good. The espresso flavor didn’t come through as much as I would like, so I may amp it up a little next time. Two technique questions: how do you keep the center of the roll from pushing up when baking? (Is it from rolling too tight, or too loose?) and how do you keep your rolled log even end to end – not bulging in the middle & tapering on the ends?
Hi Sue! I’m so glad that you loved these chocolate rolls. Aren’t they wonderfully flaky? When the rolls push up in the center, it’s usually either because they are rolled too tight OR the dough wasn’t evenly thick. When this happens, I usually pull them out of the oven and use the back of a spoon or rubber spatula to press the centers back down. Then return them to the oven. I wish I had advice to keep the dough evenly thick but what I usually do is pat it down with my hands until it feels pretty even then use a rolling pin.
As soon as I read this recipe, I knew I would love it. Melted chocolate with espresso glaze?! They were delicious–fluffy, chocolatey, sweet and sticky (I did not skimp on the glaze). Speaking of the glaze, it was awesome, and I was wondering if you have any other recipes that you use it with?
Hi Kristen! So glad you enjoy these chocolate rolls. I imagine the glaze would be wonderful on chocolate scones, regular cinnamon rolls, pumpkin cinnamon rolls, and maybe even monkey bread for something extra indulgent.
These are dangerously good. Thanks for another great recipe. My family absolutely loved them. We used a caramel frosting which we loved on them. Would easily make them again.
Delicious and Decadent! These rolls were so easy and taste oh so good! I did half a batch and they turned out fantastic, even got 8 rolls instead of 6. Love all of your recipes, so easy to follow and always yields scrumptious results. I always get so many compliments of anything I bake of yours, and always refer people to your website. Thanks for continuing to create and bake wonderful desserts!
I just made these as a pre-mother’s day gift to my mother. Halved the recipe and added toasted pecans and topped with the salted caramel sauce. She and I both really enjoyed them! Would definitely make again!
Made these for mothers day brunch but used a vanilla cream cheese glaze. Tried one ahead of time and they were amazing!
Love this recipe! I love cinnamon scrolls, so couldn’t wait to taste the chocolate version – and it was delicious! Especially when warm…thanks for another great recipe Sally!
I followed the recipe exactly and these turned out amazing! This dough is so easy to work with, and I am going to use this as a base for all my sweet rolls. Super flaky, rich, and melts in your mouth!
Made these and used the overnight method to make it easy in the morning. In both rises, the dough really puffed up a lot. It was the fluffiest bread/roll I have ever made! I had to use two different dishes, and iced only the larger group. They were delicious and exceptionally tasty, especially since my toddler wanted more (which I wasn’t willing to oblige as she didn’t need more chocolate). Great, straightforward recipe. Thank you for the video too!
A wonderful recipe! I used the overnight method and the rolls came out beautiful and so delicious this morning. Loved them 🙂
Have a good and relaxing weekend, Sally!
I have the feeling right now, even if there are some things improving pandemic-wise, this times still are pretty stressful – at least I experience them as such. So, I wanted to send good vibes your way. Also, I want to thank you for providing wonderful recipes like this one which help me spend restful times kneading dough and sitting down at breakfast with my family over freshly baked rolls.
All the best to you and your lovely family!
Hi Sina! Thank you so much for the thoughtful note. We appreciate your participation and loyal readership — happy baking to you!
Excellent! Espresso icing is spot on for flavor profile. Rolls had perfect texture. Highly recommend!
These Chocolate Sweet Rolls were absolutely delicious. I made half of the recipe per the instructions and used almond milk for the dairy. I also used double strength brewed instant coffee for the glaze in place of cream and espresso powder. They came out perfect! One thing I really appreciated about this recipe is that they are not too sweet. I was hesitant to use the glaze as I don’t like overly sweet desserts but the balance was just right. Thank you!