Homemade Dinner Rolls
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These Homemade Dinner Rolls are slightly crusty, fibrously delicious, with tender insides. Perfect for serving with a hearty soup, like Hambone or Cabbage patch soup.
These tasty rolls also compliment many entrees.
This last several years I have focused mostly on sourdough bread recipes. Sourdough recipes are amazingly delicious and digest better than these high gluten rolls. But they do require a very different method. And take a bit of time…
These dinner rolls are wonderful and can be easily completed in an afternoon. If you are a yeast bread baker I highly recommend this recipe.
Bread Baking Tips:
Proof your yeast. I have some yeast that has been in my fridge freezer for years. It’s STILL active. But I always check it by proofing.
My Large block of Red Star yeast came from Costco. It lasts well for years if kept frozen in an airtight freezer bag.
How to Proof Yeast:
Put a teaspoon of yeast in a bowl with warm water(about 110 degrees F.) and let it sit 10 minutes. It should be creamy, cloudy and rise to the top of the water in a foamy mass.
This means it’s active yeast and will do a good job of raising your dough. If your yeast is inactive (it sits at the bottom of your bowl) throw it out and get some new.
Homemade Dinner Rolls
Use Good Ingredients:
You need active yeast and fresh, good quality, hopefully organic, flours. If you’re trying to use really old flour you may not get good results. My favorite bread flours are Montana brand and King Arthur. They have good protein content and are very reliable.
The yeast sponge in this recipe is fast rising and uses whole wheat flour for extra fiber. A longer sponge recipe, like the one I used for my cinnamon rolls is preferred if you have the time and forethought to make the starter at least 8 hours ahead. This may improve your rolls flavor and texture.
I like a fibrous roll but not a tough one. These are really just about right. A nice crusty, but not tough, roll with a tender inside.
You can see the flecks of flax and whole wheat in these rolls. They have a nice, nutty flavor from the flax and whole wheat that compliments soup really well!
Homemade Dinner Rolls Recipe:
Let’s get started!
This Bosch International is what I use to make my yeast breads. My mom gave this to me a long time ago (25 years I think) when I was making bread for a family of seven on a regular basis. It mixes and kneads the dough for me really well. I LOVE that.
Dough in a large oiled bowl
I do recommend hand kneading your dough if you’ve never made bread dough.
Going through the stages of gluten formation with your hands on the dough will help you feel the texture get more resilient as you knead.
You need to understand what a dough feels like as it goes through the different stages of gluten development.
Do the window pane test.
Learn How to check the dough for doneness so you can take it out of your mixer when it is ready.
I show you how to perform the window pane test in this post.
Here’s a reminder for those of you that already know about it.
- Take a golf ball size piece of the dough out of the dough and stretch it between your two oiled hands.
- If it doesn’t stretch but just breaks, keep kneading another five minutes.
- The dough needs to be resilient and stretchy. That means the gluten is developing. A must!
- Now go stretch it again until it is transparent like a window pane. It should not break. This is a well developed gluten and will give you proper rolls.
First Rise:
Form the dough into a ball, oil it and place it in a large oiled bowl with plenty of room for the dough to double in size. Place the bowl in a warm place for an hour or so.
Cover it with a towel to protect it from drafts or place it in your oven like I do. I use my oven’s bread proofing function.
Once it’s doubled:
- Place the dough onto your clean counter and roll it into a square. Cut it evenly into 24 pieces.
Form the rolls:
- Place a section of rounded dough (I pinch the underside together to get dough tension on the top and keep the finished rolls round and light) into a greased muffin tin.
- I made a pan of rolls and used the rest to make a loaf of bread.
Second Rise:
- Brush the rolls with slightly beaten egg white and let them raise 20 to 30 minutes.
- Heat the oven to 425 degrees and bake for 15 to 20 minutes.
Homemade Dinner rolls from scratch. Fresh out of the oven.
- Eat them with butter as soon as they cool enough to handle. Or store, freeze and reheat in the microwave or oven to serve warm.
HOMEMADE DINNER ROLLS
These homemade dinner rolls are slightly crusty and fibrously delicious, with tender insides. The perfect side dish to a hearty soup, meat dinner or anytime!
Ingredients
(Sponge)
- 1 1/2 tsp. yeast
- 1/8 Cup dark molasses or honey
- 1/4 Cup warm water, 105-115 degrees F.
- 1 Cup whole wheat flour
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 2/3 Cup fresh squeezed, room temperature to warm orange juice (pulp is ok here) or water
Dough ingredients:
- 1 Cups whole wheat flour
- 3 t(o 5) cups all purpose bread flour-keep adding flour until the dough is pulling away from the sides of the mixer
- 2 Cups warm water
- 1/2 Cup flax meal
- 1 beaten egg white for glazing
Instructions
- Proof the yeast by placing yeast in your stand mixer fitted with a dough hook and add the warm water. Wait until you see the yeast bubble up to the top of the water(It's proofed) and then add remaining sponge ingredients. Mix it a pulse or two.
- Add the remaining water, flax and whole wheat flour and one cup of the white bread flour to the sponge and mix on high for three minutes.
- Reduce stand mixer's speed to low and add in enough flour to form a fairly firm dough. Mix the dough on low for 5 to 10 minutes until the dough clears the bowl sides and comes easily off the dough hook with little or no stickiness. Note different flours absorb water differently. Add more flour if it stays too sticky.
- Remove the dough from the mixer and form into one dough ball.(I put coconut oil on my hands to help the dough easily slip off my fingers when handling it.)
- Place the dough ball into a large oiled bowl, turn the dough ball until it's coated in oil and put the bowl in a warm place(about 80 degrees F.) to rise.(I use my bread proofing function on my oven).
- I did not cover the bowl in my oven but I oiled it. If you're placing the bowl onto your counter or other places with drafts. Place a towel over it.
- Set the timer for 45 minutes, check the dough and give it another 15 minutes if it's not doubled.
- Place the dough ball onto your clean counter and roll it gently into a square. You don't want to totally deflate the dough. Just roll it square and then cut it into 24 equal pieces.
- Form each piece into a ball (I pull them under and pinch). Place the balls into oiled muffin tins.(you could cut each section into two small balls and place two balls into each muffin hole for a different looking roll)
- Brush the rolls with the beaten egg white for a shiny glazed look.
- Let rise 20 to 30 minutes.
- Bake at 400 degrees F. for about 20 minutes
- Remove from oven, let cool a few minutes and then pop them out of the muffin tins with a knife. (Run the knife completely around the roll before sliding it under the roll and popping it out)
Notes
Serve warm with butter or condiments.
Freezing Instructions:
Freeze these in ziplock Freezer bags with all the air sucked out. Freeze for up to two months.
Nutrition Information
Yield
24Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 140Total Fat 4gSaturated Fat 1gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 2gCholesterol 0mgSodium 93mgCarbohydrates 24gFiber 2gSugar 3gProtein 4g
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Related Content:
- Homemade Whole Wheat Bread Recipe
- White Bread Recipe
- Yeast FlatBread Recipe
- Sourdough Breads and discard recipes
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Gosh I miss crusty rolls. This recipe looks delicious and perfect for anyone’s holiday table.
Thank you Sandi. They really are good crusty rolls
I love homemade dinner rolls, and these with their flecks of flax look so wonderful. They will just make the dinner so special!
Thank you Debi
I am always so intimidated by making breads! But you make this look soooo easy!
Loriann, This recipe is pretty quick and easy. If you haven’t worked with yeast before this is a good beginner recipe:)
This looks like a nice easy recipe. I can’t control myself around dinner rolls. I just eat so many of them.
Hi Dannii, Two things: First have you ever made homemade rolls? If they are made from good quality ingredients without bad fats and chemicals they are not SO addicting (although it’s easy to eat more than one!) Second: Always make these for a big group or plan to freeze them in small batches. If I leave these on my counter I’ll eat them for breakfast lunch and dinner…snacks. Yep! They freeze really well though:)
I love the step by step directions you’ve given – it’s been a long time since I’ve baked bread so I appreciate the helpful hints! Your recipe sounds fantastic, like others, pretty sure I can smell them thru the screen!
These are so easy to make and delicious with a meal Debra!
Nothing can beat up the smell of homemade bread! These rolls look terrific!
They are terrific katerina!
I have some left over grilled chicken in the fridge that would go great in your rolls. Shall we do a bit of a food swap?
I’ll bring the rolls! Your grilled chicken would be excellent in these. Let’s do lunch!
Your rolls look spectacular and I appreciate the lesson about yeast.
Thank you Patty!
MMm yum! I love home made bread – and what a great idea to make rolls in a muffin tin!
This is a fast,easy way to make a batch of round rolls:)
I have not baked bread in a while and after seeing this, I know I should resume and start with these delicious rolls!
I remember your homemade bread Abigail. It was fantastic! I know you would love homemade dinner rolls as well!
These are perfect and in my mind, I can smell them through my screen
These are so tempting! There’s nothing better than hot rolls and butter.
I agree KC! I love homemade dinner rolls!
Do I need to have another dish if I make these because these look fabulous and like I’d want to eat the whole basket in one sitting!
Thank you Kelly! They are delicious!
Diane, I must try these dinner rolls. Appreciate what you said about using good ingredients for yeast and organic flour. These look fantastic.
Thanks so much Suzy, for stopping by! I hope you make these dinner rolls. They are tasty!