These homemade dinner rolls are light and fluffy and also happen to be super easy to make! Fresh baked rolls make for the perfect accompaniment to almost any meal and are a must-have for holiday celebrations.
There’s nothing better than fresh homemade bread, whether it’s fancy and delicate butterflake rolls, a hearty quick bread like chocolate zucchini bread or blueberry banana bread, or these irresistible dinner rolls.
When I’m planning for a meal to celebrate a special occasion, homemade dinner rolls are always on the menu. Homemade bread tastes SO much better than anything you’d get at the store, and it’s easier to make than you’d think. This is one of my all time favorite side dish recipes for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Table of Contents
Homemade Dinner Rolls Ingredients
To make this recipe, you will need whole milk, granulated sugar, unsalted butter, a large egg, bread flour, kosher salt, and instant yeast.
How Do You Make Homemade Dinner Rolls?
Start by heating your milk to 110 degrees F. Pour the milk into the bowl of a stand mixer along with the sugar, butter and egg. Whisk all the wet ingredients together. Add the flour, yeast and salt to the bowl. Knead the dough with the mixer dough hook attachment for 4-5 minutes. Coat a large bowl with cooking spray, and transfer the dough to the bowl. Cover the bowl and let the dough rise until it doubles in size. Punch down the dough, then cut the dough into 15 equal pieces. Roll the dough into balls and place them in a greased baking dish. Let the dough rise, and preheat the oven. Bake the rolls until they are golden brown. Serve as-is, or brush with melted butter and add a sprinkle of coarse salt before serving.
Tips For The Perfect Homemade Rolls
- This recipe calls for instant yeast, also known as rapid rise yeast. Instant yeast is already activated and does not need to be soaked in liquid. You can use active dry yeast, but you’ll need to alter the recipe to let the active dry yeast proof in the warm milk for 3 minutes before you add any other ingredients.
- Your milk should be warm, but not burning hot. If the temperature of the milk exceeds 110 degrees F, the heat could kill the yeast and your dough will not rise.
- I find that the easiest way to make homemade dinner rolls is with a stand mixer, first fitted with the paddle attachment, then with the dough hook to do the kneading. You can make this recipe without a mixer, you’ll just need to knead the dough by hand for twice as long as you would with a mixer.
- Looking for rolls with a shiny top? You can follow the optional step of brushing the rolls with butter when they come out of the oven, or another option is to beat 1 egg with 1 tablespoon of water, and brush the egg mixture over the balls of dough before they go in the oven.
- This dough can be prepared in advance. Shape the dough into balls, and place them in the pan. Cover the pan and refrigerate for up to 18 hours. When you are ready to bake the rolls, remove them from the refrigerator and allow them to come to room temperature. When they are ready and have also doubled in size, heat your oven and bake according to the directions.
- Use a kitchen scale to weigh your dough pieces so that the rolls are all exactly the same size.
- Whole milk works best in this recipe, but 2% will work as well. Anything less than 2% is not recommended, as the milk’s fat content contributes to the overall taste.
Quick Tip
You can use bread flour or all purpose flour in this recipe. I recommend using bread flour for the best texture, it’s definitely worth buying!
Recipe FAQs
You can heat your rolls in the oven at 300 degrees F for about 6-8 minutes or until warmed through. I recommend serving your rolls immediately when they come out of the oven because they are best when fresh and hot.
The rising times in this recipe are a basic guideline. The best way to gauge whether your dough is done rising is to see if it has doubled in size. Yeast rises depending on the temperature of the room. If it’s a really hot day, the yeast will rise faster. If it’s a cold day, the yeast will take more time to rise. The best way to get your dough to rise faster is to place it in a warm area. If your house is cold, you can place your bowl of dough in the oven with the light turned on. Just turn on the oven light, do not actually heat the oven!
Homemade dinner rolls with stay fresh in an airtight container for up to 3 days.
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Flavor Variations
This recipe makes a mild flavored, slightly sweet bread. You can add other ingredients to the mix to customize the flavors to your tastes.
- Herbs: Add up to 1/4 cup of fresh herbs or 2 tablespoons dried herbs to the dough. Some of my favorites include fresh dill, dried Italian seasoning or a combination of fresh rosemary and sage.
- Garlic: Add 1 teaspoon freshly minced garlic to the dough. You can increase this to 2 teaspoons if you’re a true garlic lover! I like to add a pinch of Italian seasoning along with 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese to make rolls reminiscent of garlic bread.
- Sweet: Increase the sugar to 1/2 cup, and add 1-2 teaspoons of warm spices such as pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice.
- Cheese: You can add 1 cup of grated cheese such as cheddar, Monterey Jack or mozzarella.
Once you get the hang of making homemade dinner rolls, you’ll find yourself baking up a batch on a regular basis! My family always requests these rolls and I’m very much happy to oblige.
More Great Side Dish Recipes
Roasted Root Vegetables
55 mins
Sauteed Brussels Sprouts
15 mins
Baked Mac and Cheese
50 mins
Corn Casserole Recipe
55 mins
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
40 mins
Love This Recipe?
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Homemade Dinner Rolls
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups whole milk
- 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter melted
- 1 large egg beaten, at room temperature
- 4 – 4 1/2 cups bread flour
- 1 1/4 teaspoons kosher salt
- 1 tablespoon instant yeast
- cooking spray
- extra melted butter and coarse salt for serving optional
Instructions
- Begin by heating the milk until it reaches a temperature of 110 degrees F. You can do this either by gently warming it up in the microwave for about a minute or on the stove. I suggest using an instant-read thermometer to make sure it's the right temperature.
- Take the warm milk and pour it into the bowl of a stand mixer along with the sugar, melted butter, and beaten egg. Whisk together until combined.
- Next, add 4 cups of flour to the mixer, along with the instant yeast and the kosher salt.
- Attach the dough hook to your mixer, and knead the dough on medium speed until it starts to come together.
- Once the dough comes together, keep kneading the dough for about 4 to 5 minutes. If the dough isn't quite pulling away from the sides of the bowl as it kneads in the mixer, begin to sprinkle in a couple of tablespoons of flour until it does.
- Once your dough is perfectly kneaded, take a large bowl and coat it with cooking spray. Transfer your dough to the bowl, then cover it up with plastic wrap. Let it rise until it doubles in size, which can take anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes, depending on how warm your kitchen is.
- Punch down the dough to let out any extra air. Remove from the bowl and use a bench scraper or a knife to divide the dough into 15 equal-sized pieces. You can use a kitchen scale to weigh the pieces of dough for rolls that are exactly the same size.
- Roll each piece of dough into a ball and place the balls into a 9×13 baking pan that is coated in cooking spray.
- Cover your rolls plastic wrap and let them rise again until they've doubled in size.
- While your dough is rising, preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.
- When the rolls have doubled in size, place the pan into the preheated oven and let the rolls bake for 17 to 20 minutes, or until they are golden brown.
- Remove the rolls from the oven. The next step is completely optional, but highly recommended. Brush your rolls with melted butter and sprinkle a touch coarse salt on top. Cut the rolls apart, then serve and enjoy.
Notes
- I recommend using bread flour for the best texture. You can also use all purpose flour if that’s what you have on hand.
- Looking for rolls with a shiny top? You can follow the optional step of brushing the rolls with butter when they come out of the oven, or another option is to beat 1 egg with 1 tablespoon of water, and brush the egg mixture over the balls of dough before they go in the oven.
- This recipe calls for instant yeast, also known as rapid rise yeast. Instant yeast is already activated and does not need to be soaked in liquid. You can use active dry yeast, but you’ll need to alter the recipe to let the active dry yeast proof in the warm milk for 3 minutes before you add any other ingredients.
These were perfect and easy to make! Going to be on the menu for Thanksgiving this year!
These dinner rolls are perfection! I’ve made them twice and they’re my new go to recipe!
I completely agree with you. Nothing beats fresh, hot bread at dinner time. These easy to make and perfect dinner rolls are going to be devoured by my family.
These rolls were surprisingly easy to make and turned out as good as my favorite bakery’s dinner rolls!! I know I’ll be making these often – they’re such a great side for almost any meal!
These were so light and fluffy, and practically melted in my mouth. Absolutely delicious and SO much better than any store bought dinner rolls!
Your recipes are very hard if not impossible to print out. Including an AD in the text block messes the printing up!
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