Yeast Dinner Rolls

Here's a recipe for some yummy yeast dinner rolls that we made during the first week of my Baking and Pastries class. They were so good I had to come home and make them! Not only that, but this recipe will be on my midterm in a few short weeks so I figure the more practice I get, the better! It's an easy recipe to make; however you will need a scale to weigh out the ingredients.

I used to hate when I would see a recipe that I wanted to make and it was listed out in pounds and ounces instead of cups and tablespoons and teaspoons. In fact, I would just skip over it since I had never tried weighing out the ingredients and didn't have a digital scale at home. So I am sorry for those of you like this. I get it and totally understand; however now that I am in culinary school I must say that I now understand how much more accurate it is to measure by weight rather than volume. And now that I have a digital scale (we had to buy one for class), I actually like weighing ingredients out. It's fun! So if you can, give it a try. Otherwise, you may miss out on some really great recipes.

*Note: I made only 1/2 the recipe below.





Soft Yeast Dinner Rolls
Source: On Baking: A Textbook of Baking and Pastry Fundamentals

2 oz. Active dry yeast
1 lb. 8 oz. Water (100-110°F)
2 lb. 12 oz. Bread flour
1 oz. Salt
4 oz. Sugar
2 oz. Nonfat dry milk powder
2 oz. Shortening
2 oz. Unsalted butter, softened
3.2 oz. Eggs (2 eggs)
Egg wash, as needed

1. Dissolve yeast in the water in a bowl. Combine flour, salt, sugar, milk powder, shortening, butter, and eggs in bowl of a mixer fitted with a dough hook.

2. Add water and yeast mixture to mixer bowl, stir to combine.

3. Knead on medium speed for 10 minutes or until dough reaches 77°F.

4. Transfer dough to lightly greased bowl, cover and place in warm spot. Ferment until doubled, approximately 1 hour.

5. Punch down dough. Let it rest a few minutes to allow the gluten to relax.

6. Divide dough into 2 oz. portions and round. Shape as desired and arrange on paper-lined sheet pans. Carefully brush with egg wash and proof until doubled in size.

7. Bake at 400°F for approximately 12-15 minutes.

8. Optional - Brush rolls with melted butter while still warm.