Restaurant Dinner Rolls recipe

This recipe came from the King Arthur Flour website. These dinner rolls are fabulous and relatively easy to make. I hope you enjoy them as much as we do.

Restaurant Dinner Rolls

YIELD: 10 large rolls, 20 servings
BAKING TEMPERATURE: 350 deg F
BAKING TIME: 25 - 30 mins

These dinner rolls replicate the soft, mildly sweet, deep chocolate-colored rolls served at various chain restaurants (particularly steakhouses) around the country. The taste-testers here at KAF raved about these, so even if they're not an exact match for those restaurant rolls, we're sure you'll find them tasty.

We make these rolls about twice as large as the typical dinner roll, shaping them into little logs before baking. Now, close your eyes and imagine each roll on its own serving board, complete with a tiny ramekin of whipped butter. Conjure up a salad bar. There! You're dining out without ever leaving the house.

1 cup (8 ounces) lukewarm water
1/2 cup (2 5/8 ounces) orange juice
4 tablespoon (1/2 stick, 2 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into 6 pieces
1/2 cup (4ounces) honey
2 1/4 cups (9 ounces) traditional whole wheat flour
2 1/4 cups (9 1/2 ounces) unbleached bread flour
1 3/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons (1 1/4 ounces) sugar
2 tablespoons (3/8 ounces) Dutch-process cocoa
2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast


TO PREPARE THE DOUGH: Combine all the dough ingredients, and mix and knead them --- by hand, mixer or bread machine --- until you have a medium - soft, smooth dough. Cover and allow the dough until it's quite puffy, though probably not doubled in bulk, 1 to 2 hours. Lightly grease a baking sheet of line with parchment paper.

TO SHAPE THE ROLLS: Gently deflate the dough, and transfer it to a lightly greased work surface. Divide the dough into 10 even pieces (about 4 ounces each), and shape the pieces into 5 x 2-inch oval rolls. Place the rolls on the prepared baking sheet, and allow them to rise, covered, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. They won't have doubled in size, but will appear puffy; when you gently press your finger into one, the indentation will rebound quite slowly. Toward the end of the rise, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

TO BAKE THE ROLLS: Uncover and bake the rolls until the bottoms appear slightly browned (you'll have to carefully pick one up to look) or until an instant-read thermometer inserted in the center of a roll reads about 200 degrees F, 25 to 30 minutes. Remove the rolls from the oven, and cool them on a rack.