These French style dinner rolls are soft, delicious and totally addicting. A family favorite fool-proof recipe guaranteed to satisfy everyone!
Today I decided to share these delicious dinner rolls recipe because it’s one of my favorite things to eat AND bake. Easily!
Since I was a little kid I remember being obsessed with bread. Nowadays I simply enjoy (in moderation) but I can’t count the times I was yelled at for eating an entire bag of fresh warm rolls which was supposed to be shared with the whole family, hahaha!
Now I can easily say that my kids took after me, because they can’t resist a nice fresh dinner roll, especially if they are still warm. This works with me because I love baking bread, and a while back decided to take a few classes to learn the tricks and techniques of baking delicious breads.
Basically what made the world of a difference for me was understanding how to work with the yeast, after all the yeast is what makes bread –bread– so it was definitely worth understanding what was necessary to properly activate the yeast.
Without the complicated terminology (which is why we don’t understand how to work with yeast), just think of it as a live colony that has been asleep for a long time. In order for this live colony to wake up and turn flour into soft delicious bread, we must wake up this colony, not in a disruptive way but rather “relaxed” way, much like you would with yourself.
How would you like to be abruptly woken up, tossed in an ice-cold shower and send to work expecting that you will perform your best. Hmm… not likely right?
Much like yourself, the yeast perform much better if “woken” up in warm water. Now, because the yeast is live, technically it needs to feed on something and what better then SUGAR! This is the reason you see a random tablespoon of sugar in all bread recipes (or any form of sweetener).
Once you spent a few minutes making the yeast happy, it will give you the performance you need to bake the most amazing, delicious, soft and buttery dinner rolls you ever had!
These French style dinner rolls are totally addicting and never last more then a few minutes in the basket. They melt in your mouth when served warm with a little bit of butter. I also love making an egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast in these soft rolls.
If you have kids they will be all over these rolls and by that I mean, you should probably hide some for yourself. Trust me on this one!
Hope you give this recipe a go and if you have any question about the process I am just one click away 🙂
French Bread Dinner Rolls
Ingredients
- 4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1 1/2 cups warm water
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 2 1/4 tsp instant yeast
- 2 1/2 tbsp olive oil divided
Instructions
- Pre-heat oven to 200F degrees.
- Whisk to combine the warm water, sugar and yeast. Cover and set aside for 5 mins.
- Sift flour and mix in salt. Add in yeast and 2 tbsp olive oil. Start working the dough with a wooden spoon until it has absorbed all the liquids and then switch to working with your hands.
- Lightly four a clean surface on the table/ counter/ marble and work the dough, stretching it out and folding for about 5 minutes. Form into a large ball.
- Spray a large glass bowl with cooking oil. Place dough in the center, cover with foil and transfer to oven. TURN THE OVEN OFF AT THIS POINT and allow the dough to rise in warm oven for about 45-60 mins or until is has doubled its size.
- Remove dough from oven and immediately start to pre-heat the oven to 425F degrees.
- Meanwhile form dough into ice-cream-scoop sized balls. Place them in 2 medium sized sheet pan over a layer of parchment paper. Brush rolls with remaining olive oil and bake on top rack for 13-15 mins or until the rolls start to turn golden and develop a crust.
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Love these French bread rolls! Lovely pictures too 😉
Thanks cousin, next time you are here I’ll have to make some for you!! xoxo 🙂
These were amazing!! I added a little more salt and put a couple of ice cubes in the bottom of the oven and they came out great!
That’s good to hear Shakeema. Thanks so much for your feedback!
I made these and they came out as the recipe said. Real good. That said, I bet if you added steam (via an oven function) or filled a cook or tin with water and put it on a bottom rack you could end up with rolls that have a hard outer crust like French bread.
Glad to hear! thanks for the tip too 🙂
I made these a few times, always great. Can I bake this as a loaf? If so, do you know what adjustments I would need to make with cook time and temperature? Thanks.
That’s great to hear Mariah! I actually never tested this recipe in a loaf, so it’s hard to say. Have you tried my other loaf bread recipe instead? Its a delicious bread, I make all the time at home, in fact I made again this weekend. One recipe makes two loaves of bread 🙂
I will have to give it a try, thank you!