Skip to main content
Bread

Dinner or Breakfast Rolls

A yeast-based roll dough made with flour, butter, milk, and eggs, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Dinner or Breakfast Rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA rather brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a rather brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Crumble the butter into the flour and mix in the salt.

  2. In a bowl, combine the yeast and sugar with warm milk.

  3. Make a well in the flour, pour in the yeast mixture, and stir to form a thick batter.

  4. Cover with a cloth and let rise in a warm place for about 1 hour.

  5. Once risen, mix in the egg and additional warm milk to form a smooth dough.

  6. Cover again and let rise for 30 to 45 minutes.

Shape and bake

  1. Turn the dough onto a floured surface and divide into 24 equal portions.

  2. Knead each portion lightly into small rolls and make incisions on top.

  3. Place rolls on floured baking sheets, spaced apart, and let prove for 15 to 20 minutes.

  4. Brush tops with egg yolk mixed with milk and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 10 to 15 minutes.

  5. Cool upside down on a dish after baking.

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. Butter + milktop 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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

All-purpose flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the rolls their structure.
Yeast
Ferments the dough, producing gas that makes the rolls rise.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and softens the texture.
Egg
Adds richness and helps bind the dough, adding structure and color.
Milk
Provides moisture that hydrates the flour and forms the dough.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds a little sweetness and browning.

The step that matters

Brushing tops with egg yolk and milk before baking. The egg wash promotes even browning and a glossy crust, and it should be applied evenly without pooling so the rolls brown uniformly.

“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 dinner rolls recipes

Fried 8 See all 20 →

You might also like

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