I hope you all are enjoying Easter morning as much as I am. I think I may have found the Easter bunny sleeping on the couch after a long hard night of chocolate delivery.
Like any other Sunday morning, I’m deep into the routine of preparing my meals for the week. I’ve got sweet potatoes roasting to make some soup later. I am dehydrating some other sweet potatoes and bananas for the dogs treats, and I’m knee deep in making rolls for dinner. I even have cheese on the go, don’t you worry that post is soon to come!
Any way – back to these rolls. I’m going to AJ’s Aunt and Uncle’s place today for dinner, and I figured rolls would be the answer to the question – what do you bring to Easter Dinner? I debated sweets but it’s Easter and most of us are chocolated out. They always make so much food I don’t want to add to the buffet, but they don’t bake bread to my knowledge so this is what I settled on. I found a recipe on Our Best Bites years ago that I just never had tried. I usually only cook for AJ and I and any extras will find their way to my co-workers. I made a few super minor adjustments you probably won’t even catch but they turned out just as advertised, light and fluffy, butter and sweet – perfect for any traditional or holiday dinner.
White Dinner Rolls
adapted from Our Best Bites, World’s Best Dinner Rolls
- 2 cups of 2% dairy milk
- ½ cup white sugar
- 1 tbs of honey
- 1/3 cup of salted butter
- 1 tbs of coarse sea salt or kosher salt
- 5 tsp of yeast
- 2/3 cup of warm water
- 7-9 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 free-range eggs, beaten
- extra butter for the tops and for serving
Method
In a medium sauce pan heat milk, butter, sugar and salt over medium heat. Remove just before butter is melted, stir well and set aside to cool.
In a large (largest you have) bowl, sprinkle yeast on 2/3 cup of warm water and honey. Let proof for 10 minutes while the milk mixture cools.
In a small bowl beat eggs and set aside. Test the temperature of the milk, it should be slightly warmer than room temperature. Whisk milk into proofed yeast. Beat in 3 cups of flour until well combined, which make take up to 3 minutes. Pour in beaten eggs and fully incorporate until the dough is smooth and silky. Continue to beat in flour one cup at a time until dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl but is still quite sticky to handle.
The original recipe calls for 8-9 cups of flour but I got to about 7 and a 1/2 cups before I felt it was ready. The dough stiffens up a little bit but remains sticky after the rise, if you add too much flour before the rise your rolls will be dense and heavy. Let rise for 1 hour in a warm oven. I usually turn my oven on it’s lowest setting and shut it off about 5 minutes before I put my dough into proof.
Lightly flour your work surface.With a knife/hands or a spatula cut dough into two equal parts and turn out onto floured surface. The recipes calls for 24 equal pieces in total but I cut mine into 8ths. I think my rolls were too big, so I would suggest the smaller size if you can. That means after cutting your dough into half, you cut in half again and then into thirds.
Prepare two 9×13 baking dishes with non-stick spray. I only had one 9×13 so I used a pie plate as well. Take each clump of dough and roll well in your hands, it should feel like a more airy version of play dough. Place each roll in the dish spaced as evenly as you can, apart from the next.
Cover with a damp towel and let rise for 30 minutes. With about 10 minutes left to your rise time, preheat the oven to 375. Place rolls in the oven and cook for about 15 minutes, until the tops are golden brown. Brush with softened butter.
V-Spot 