Skip to main content
Bread

French Rolls

French rolls are yeast‑leavened dough rolls baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

French Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sponge

  1. Combine milk and yeast in a bowl.

  2. Add enough flour to create a stiff batter.

  3. Cover and let it rise overnight.

Make the dough

  1. Add egg, butter, and more flour to make a stiff dough.

  2. Mix well and let it rise again.

  3. Knead the dough until smooth and white.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and cut it with a round cutter.

  2. Fold each piece over.

  3. Place the rolls in a pan, cover them, and let them rise in a warm place until light.

  4. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden brown.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Milk
Provides liquid and milk solids that help the rolls brown and feel tender.
Yeast
Ferments sugars in the batter, producing gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Flour
Forms gluten when mixed with liquid, giving the dough structure to hold its shape and rise.
Egg
Adds richness and structure, helping the rolls set and hold together as they bake.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and gives a softer texture and richer flavor.

The step that matters

Kneading the dough until smooth. Kneading develops the gluten network so the dough can trap gas from the yeast. Under-kneaded dough bakes up dense and less able to rise well.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More french rolls recipes

Asparagus Stuffed 4 See all 185 →

You might also like

CornbreadCornbread345 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding336 recipesMilk Bread RollsMilk Bread Rolls242 recipesPotato BreadPotato Bread124 recipes