Homemade rolls

These rolls are great because you can freeze them and they taste as good as if you made them that day. These are also great cinnamon rolls. One of my favorite memories growing up was Sunday dinner with my mom's homemade rolls. I remember people would ask my mom for her recipe and they would come back and say they couldn't get it right. I finally decided to tackle my moms roll recipe and had her show me how to make rolls. I wrote down her little tricks along the way. This is what I came up with.

Dinner and Cinnamon Rolls (mom)-original recipe

1 cup scalded milk

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

2 Tbsp yeast, dissolved in ½ cup water

2/3 cup sugar

½ cup shortening

approximately 6 cups flour

Scald milk. Mix eggs, sugar, shortening, salt and milk with enough flour to make a cake like batter. Add yeast and the rest of flour until you have a very soft dough. Let rise until double in bulk. For dinner rolls that you are going to freeze, punch dozen and roll out to ¼ inch thick. Spread with butter and shape into crescents. Place on lightly greased cookie sheet. Put in freezer immediately. DO not allow to rise. The day you want hot rolls, remove from freezer, take tin foil off, let rise on wire rack for 3-4 hours (depending on how warm you house is). Bake at 375 degrees for 18-20 minutes. Brush with margarine.

If you are going to serve these rolls the same day, after punching them down, allow them to rise again to double in bulk. Roll out to ¼ inch thick, spread with margarine and shape into crescents.

Dinner and Cinnamon Rolls-mom-mine and my friend Mary’s observations

1 cup scalded milk

1 tsp salt

2 large eggs (3 medium)

2 Tbs rapid rise or instant yeast, dissolved in ½ cups water (115-125 degrees)

½ cup shortening

2/3 cup sugar

approximately 6 cups of flour

Get all ingredients out (so that they are room temperature) and into their measuring cups before you begin. Put yeast in ½ cups of water (115-125 degrees) and add almost a tablespoon of sugar; mix with your pinky finger.  The yeast proofs better in a cone-shaped bowl that isn’t too big so that the yeast will climb the sides of the bowl. Let yeast rise.  

Pour a generous cup of milk (almost 1 ¼ cup) into a sauce pan and scald milk over medium high heat. When it begins to boil/be bubbly, take off burner and add shortening to sauce pan with milk to let it melt. The top of the milk will look like it has a film or coating over it. Mix the milk with shortening, being careful not scrape from the bottom. 

 In a large bowl that will hold your final dough product, beat eggs until they are pale yellow in color, and foamy (this gets a lot of air into them and makes the rolls lighter).  Add sugar and salt. SLowly add a little of the hot milk with shortening in because you don’t want to cook the eggs and mix with beaters. Alternate between flour and milk mixture, in 1/2 cup increments, making a runny cake like batter. Do this all the while mixing with beaters. This is not completely smooth. The temperature should be still warm, not hot, about 106-108 degrees. The batter needs to be runny so the yeast mixes well---(this equaled about 3 cups of flour and the entire sauce pan of milk and shortening).

Add yeast (scrape yeast bowl to get all of it) and mix, but not too long or it won’t be soft. Add the rest of the flour until you have a very soft (and somewhat sticky) dough. I try to put the beaters towards the top of the dough as to not over mix. When the dough began to thicken, stop using the mixer and stir with a large spoon. 

Add another cup of flour. Don’t stir too much. Gently stir with spoon and add another 1 ¾ cup flour, scraping off the sides. Add ¼ cup of flour and begin to punch down with your hands (she kind of poked the flour into the dough at first). The dough will be pillow like. Add about ½ cup more flour. It is ready to rise when you can pull the dough from the sides and it will be a little sticky. It is okay if a little flour is on the outside. (she added about 5 ¾ more cups, which equals around 8 ¾ cups total. She said more than how much flour, you have to go on texture and feel…it will be shiny and smooth, and sticky to the touch.) 

Let it rest, then put a little shortening on your hands and pull in all 4 sides and turn dough over. Put lid on loosely and cover the lid with a kitchen towel. Let rise until double in bulk, or the lid begins to come off…about an hour.

For dinner rolls:

If freezing: punch down dough and put a very small amount of flour on counter. (You should either pinch off or cut off the dough.) Place dough on flour and roll out to ¼ inch thick. Pour a little melted butter on dough circle and spread. Cut into crescent/wedge shapes with a knife.  

How to roll: 

Start at the largest part of the wedge and tuck the corners in. Roll crescent style. Add a little dough as needed (to the center of the wedge) or take some off. Place on lightly greased cookie sheet. Mom did not grease her pans. Rolls should have about ¼ inch space between them on the cookie sheet. Cover with tin foil. Put in freezer immediately. Do not allow to rise.  

The day you want hot rolls, remove from freezer, take tin foil off, let rise on for 3-4 hours (depending on how warm your house is). I usually freeze them on a cookie sheet and once they are completely frozen, I take them off and put them in a ziploc bag. I just grab out however many I need. Bake at 375 degrees for 18-20 minutes. Brush with butter while they are still hot. (check the rolls before 18 minutes because I put my rolls in before the oven was up to temperature and they baked in roughly 13 minutes.)

If you are going to serve these rolls the same day, after punching down, allow them to rise again to double in bulk. Roll out to ½ inch thick, spread with margarine and shape into crescents. After baking you can rub butter on top of the rolls to make them soft on the outside and taste buttery.

For Cinnamon Rolls:

If freezing, punch down and roll out to ¼ inch thick on a slightly floured surface Put some melted butter on your fingers. Spread enough melted butter on top of dough to get it wet and have cinnamon stick to it. Put cinnamon on top and rub around with your fingers. This should cover the dough well with your melted butter.  

Add cinnamon mixture (I watched her combine white sugar, cinnamon, and brown sugar but I don’t have any idea on the measurements – just have to experiment to get the taste you want) and spread over dough. At this point you can also add chopped nuts and raisins or whatever else you want. (Begin rolling the dough with the longer side and as you get close to the end tuck in the ends so that the fillings don’t come out and then roll to close)

Roll up the entire thing of dough, tucking in sides to keep it all together. Place seam side down. Take a string of dental floss and put it under your rolled up dough (should look like a log). Take the two ends and criss cross them over the dough to slice it. Do not make fat cinnamon rolls. Lay cinnamon roll onto its flat side and continue to cut the rest of the log roll of dough. As soon as they are all on the tray, cover with tin foil (make sure the rolls are covered air tight so that they don’t dry out and later you can transfer the rolls from the metal tray to freezer bags to store) and immediately put them in the freezer. Do not let them rise at all. 

When you are ready to have cinnamon rolls, take them out and let rise, 2-3 hours, depending on how warm your house is. Put them in a preheated oven of 375 degrees and bake for 18-20 minutes, checking them after 15 minutes. As soon as you take them out of the oven, pour on frosting.

 

If you are going to immediately serve these cinnamon rolls, punch down and roll out to ¼ inch thick. Spread enough melted butter on top of dough to get it wet and have cinnamon stick to it. Put cinnamon on top and spread around with your hands. This should cover the dough well with your melted butter. Add cinnamon mixture and spread over dough. Roll up the entire thing of dough. Take a string of dental floss and put it under your rolled up dough (should look like a log). Take the two ends and criss cross them over the dough to slice it. Lay cinnamon roll onto its flat side and continue to cut the rest of the log roll of dough. 

Let the rolls rise, then bake at 375 degrees for 18-20 minutes, checking them after 15 minutes.

Honey butter

1 quart warm honey

2 eggs

3 cubes butter or margarine

1 tsp vanilla

Beat in blender until well blended. Store in the fridge indefinitely.

Cinnamon mixture

Cinnamon

White Sugar

Brown sugar

Mix the desired amount of each to put in dough for cinnamon rolls

Frosting for cinnamon rolls

Powdered sugar

milk

vanilla

Put powdered sugar into a bowl and add small amount of milk until desired consistency. Add in a little vanilla until you like the taste.