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Home baked bread is one of the best foods there is. There is nothing quite like bread pulled fresh from the oven with some fresh butter on it.

This recipe is so versatile, you can use it as the base for so many things. As is, for these dinner rolls, for a home made hot pocket, for a loaf of bread. Add in some oatmeal, replace some white flour with whole wheat, use honey instead of sugar to sweeten, oil instead of butter for flavor, more salt, a bit less salt, some garlic powder, some herbs. The possibilities are endless. Experiment with your bread making! Once you get the general technique down its really, really, really hard to mess up bread.

I’m going to write up these instructions assuming you have a stand mixer. If you do not, you can still make this. Just mix everything in a bowl and knead by hand. It will take you longer, but it will still be very good!

For today, lets just get this one thing down. Simple dinner rolls. So easy. So good.

Put 3 cups of warm water into your mixer along with 2 Tbsp yeast.

Let that sit for about 5 minutes and make sure it gets a bit bubbly. That’s “proofing” your yeast. If your water was too hot when you added the yeast, you will have killed the yeast and you will get none of the foamy/bubbly yeast growth.

Now drizzle your melted (but not too hot!!) butter into the running mixer and let it get thoroughly worked into the dough. Keep mixing and keep adding flour slowly until your soft, sticky dough turns into a smooth, not sticky, ball. It should clean off the sides of your mixer.

Place the dough into a greased bowl and cover with a towel.

Let this rise until doubled in a warm, draft-free place. Punch down the dough, grease up your hands, and form into palm-sized balls. You can get that smooth uniform exterior by pulling and pinching the dough from the bottom and pushing it up into itself.  Place the formed rolls onto a prepped baking pan and cover.

Let rise until doubled, and then bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 15-18 minutes, or until golden brown.

Rub the tops of the baked rolls with some butter. Feel free to get creative and mix in some herbs and seasonings to that butter if you’d like! For these, I added a bit more salt, garlic powder, and parsley.

Simple Dinner Rolls

Soft, fresh rolls straight from your oven to your table.

Ingredients

1. 3 cups warm water
2. 2 TBSP yeast
3. 1/2 cup sugar
4. 1 TBSP salt
5. 1/2 cup butter, melted but NOT hot
6. 6-8 cups approximately bread flour

Instructions

1. Place warm water & yeast into your mixer. Let sit 5 minutes and make sure there is some bubbles and foam forming.

2. Add sugar & salt. Start mixer and add enough flour to form a sticky dough.

3. Drizzle butter into mixer while running. Let it fully incorporate into dough.

4. Slowly continue to add flour while the mixer is running until a soft flexible dough forms and the sides of your mixer are "cleaned" off by the dough.

5. Place in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise until doubled in a warm draft-free place.

6. Punch down and form rolls. Place on prepped baking sheet, cover, and let rise until doubled again.

7. Bake in a preheated 375 degree oven for 15-17 minutes, or until golden brown. Rub the tops of the baked rolls with butter.