You only need 7 ingredients to make these dinner rolls. Flaky, soft, and buttery, these fresh dinner rolls outshine any main dish. If you’re a bread beginner, read this blog post to learn more about the yeast rolls recipe, including how to prep the rolls ahead of time. You can also reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.
This recipe is brought to you in partnership with Red Star Yeast.
- Do you long to bake homemade bread but are too intimidated to start?
- Does yeast dough send you running for the hills?
- Do bread recipes seem overly complicated and confusing?
I’m teaching you how to make homemade dinner rolls. These are the best homemade dinner rolls I’ve ever had and it all starts with a straightforward 7-ingredient dough. I make these rolls whenever I get the chance and even brought a pan to our friends who just welcomed a baby. They’re pillow-soft with the most delicious flaky and buttery texture. Everyone will demand you bake them on repeat.
And with this recipe, I guarantee you will finally feel confident baking bread. 🙂
This recipe is such a fan favorite, that it deserved a spot in print! You’ll also find this recipe in my cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
Video Tutorial: Dinner Rolls
Let’s start with a video tutorial.
Overview: How to Make Homemade Dinner Rolls
- Make the dough. Continue below to learn more about this dough recipe.
- Knead the dough. Reference my How to Knead Dough video tutorial if you need extra help with this step.
- Cover the dough and let it rise. The dough rises in about 1-2 hours in a relatively warm environment.
- Punch down the dough to release the air and shape into rolls.
- Let the rolls rise for about 1 hour.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes until golden brown. If desired, brush the warm rolls with a little honey and melted butter for extra flavor.
As shown in the video tutorial, the dough comes together with a mixer. You can use a paddle attachment or a dough hook. You can also make the dough by hand, but it requires a bit of arm muscle. After the dough comes together in the mixing bowl, it’s time to knead. You can simply continue beating the dough with the mixer for this step or you can knead the dough by hand. I chose to knead the dough by hand so you can see me doing it in the video above.
If you’re new to bread making, my How to Knead Dough post and video can help even more with this step. And my Baking with Yeast Guide is a wonderful resource for all bread beginners!
Soft Dinner Rolls Require a Rich Dough
The crustier and chewier the bread, the less fat in the dough. This is known as a lean dough. The softer and richer the bread, the more fat in the dough. This is known as a rich dough. Unlike chewy homemade bagels, focaccia, ciabatta, and my artisan bread, soft dinner rolls require a rich dough. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean that the dough is swimming in cash. Rather, “rich” correlates with the amount of fat. For example, this dough has milk, butter, and egg.
You need 7 ingredients total. They’re the same ingredients in my easy cinnamon rolls and homemade brioche, which are also rich doughs. (Though I use more sugar for sweeter cinnamon rolls, of course.)
- Milk: Liquid activates the yeast. For the softest dinner rolls, use whole milk. Nondairy or low fat milks work too, but whole milk produces phenomenal flavor and texture.
- Yeast: You can use active dry yeast or instant yeast. If using active dry yeast, the rise times will be a little longer. I recommend Platinum Yeast from Red Star, which is an instant yeast blended with natural dough improvers.
- Sugar: Sugar feeds the yeast, increases its activity, and tenderizes the dough.
- Egg: 1 egg provides structure and flavor.
- Butter: Butter promises a flavorful and soft dinner roll. Make sure it’s room temperature.
- Salt: You can’t make flavorful bread without salt!
- Flour: You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour in this recipe. All-purpose flour is convenient for most, but bread flour produces chewier dinner rolls. There are no other changes to the recipe if you use bread flour.
Once you make the dough, let it rise:
After that, punch down the risen dough. Shape into balls and arrange in a baking pan. Don’t worry if they’re not all uniform in size.
Let the shaped rolls rise before baking. Look how puffy they get after 1 hour of rising:
How to Shape Dinner Rolls
You can shape this dough many different ways including twisted rolls, knotted rolls (how I shape garlic knots), cloverleaf rolls, or even hot dog buns. Let’s stick with the basic round shape. Divide the dough into 14-16 pieces. Take a piece and stretch the top of the dough while pinching and sealing the bottom. Make sure the rolls are smooth on top and sealed on the bottom. I shape hot cross buns the same exact way.
How to Make Yeast Rolls Ahead of Time
The rolls require around 3 hours of rising. Not everyone has 3 hours to spare, so let’s discuss another option! Prepare the dough, let it rise, and shape the rolls. Cover the shaped rolls tightly and refrigerate for up to about 16 hours. At least 3 hours before you need them the next day, remove the rolls from the refrigerator and allow to rise on the counter for about 1-2 hours before baking.
And here’s how to freeze dinner rolls: Follow the make-ahead instructions and instead of refrigerating overnight, freeze the rolls in a baking pan. Once frozen, they won’t stick together anymore and you can place them in a freezer bag. Let them thaw and rise for about 4-5 hours, then bake. You can also freeze the baked dinner rolls. Therefore, if you want a smaller batch, you can make the entire recipe and bake only a few fresh rolls at a time.
These make-ahead options are especially helpful if you want fresh-baked rolls for Easter brunch, Thanksgiving dinner, or on Christmas.
Dinner Roll Flavors
How about some pizazz? Mix in these ingredients when you add the flour.
- Rosemary Dinner Rolls – 2 Tablespoons fresh or dried chopped rosemary.
- Cheddar Dinner Rolls – 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese. Other cheese varieties work, but avoid super soft cheeses.
- Garlic & Herb Dinner Rolls – 2 teaspoons each: dried rosemary, dried basil, & dried parsley, along with 1 teaspoon garlic powder.
- Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls
- Brown Butter Sage Dinner Rolls
- Honey Butter Rolls
- Sweet Potato Dinner Rolls
- Oatmeal Molasses Dinner Rolls
- Multigrain Rolls – Here is my Multigrain Bread recipe that you can turn into rolls.
They’re also fantastic with a simple swipe of homemade honey butter or homemade cinnamon butter.
This dough is not ideal for a big loaf of bread. Instead, I recommend using a leaner dough, such as my sandwich bread or whole wheat bread recipes. If you need an egg free dough, try homemade breadsticks instead. And if you love pizza, try these pizza pull apart rolls next!
3 Success Tips
- Reference my Baking with Yeast Guide, which answers many common yeast FAQs.
- Make sure your yeast isn’t expired. Expiration date is on the package.
- Directly from the pros at Red StarYeast: Measuring flour correctly is key to avoiding a dense dough, which leads to heavy (not soft!) rolls. Spoon and level your flour, do not scoop it out of the package.
My final piece of advice? Don’t limit these rolls to suppertime. They’re welcome anywhere, with any meal, any time of day. Use for sliders, breakfast sandwiches, soaking up your favorite tomato sauce with slow cooker turkey meatballs, alongside salad, or dunking into a bowl of creamy chicken noodle soup. Above all, don’t doubt yourself because you, too, can become a bread baking pro.
Soft Dinner Rolls Recipe
- Prep Time: 3 hours, 25 minutes
- Cook Time: 22 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours, 45 minutes
- Yield: 14-16 rolls
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
You only need 7 ingredients to make these dinner rolls. Flaky, soft, and buttery, these fresh dinner rolls outshine any main dish. See recipe notes for freezing and overnight instructions. You can also reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs. This recipe is also in my cookbook, Sally’s Baking 101.
Ingredients
- 1 cup (240ml) whole milk, warmed to about 110°F (43°C)
- 2 and 1/4 teaspoons Platinum Yeast from Red Star instant yeast (1 standard packet)
- 2 Tablespoons granulated sugar, divided
- 1 large egg
- 1/4 cup (4 Tbsp; 56g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature and cut into 4 pieces
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 3 cups (390g) all-purpose flour or bread flour* (spooned & leveled)
- optional topping: 2 Tablespoons (28g) melted unsalted butter mixed with 1 Tablespoon honey
Instructions
- Prepare the dough: Whisk the warm milk, yeast, and 1 Tablespoon of sugar together in the bowl of your stand mixer. Cover and allow to sit for 5 minutes. *If you do not own a stand mixer, you can do this in a large mixing bowl and in the next step, mix the dough together with a large wooden spoon/silicone spatula. It will take a bit of arm muscle. A hand mixer works, but the sticky dough repeatedly gets stuck in the beaters. Mixing by hand with a wooden spoon or silicone spatula is a better choice.*
- Add the remaining sugar, egg, butter, salt, and 1 cup flour. With a dough hook or paddle attachment, mix/beat on low speed for 30 seconds, scrape down the sides of the bowl with a silicone spatula, then add the remaining flour. Beat on medium speed until the dough comes together and pulls away from the sides of the bowl, about 2 minutes. If the dough seems too wet to a point where kneading (next step) would be impossible, beat in more flour 1 Tablespoon at a time until you have a workable dough, similar to the photos above. Dough should be soft and a little sticky, but still manageable to knead with lightly floured hands.
- Knead the dough: Keep the dough in the mixer and beat for an additional 5 full minutes, or knead by hand on a lightly floured surface for 5 full minutes. (If you’re new to bread-baking, my How to Knead Dough video tutorial can help here.) If the dough becomes too sticky during the kneading process, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of flour at a time on the dough or on the work surface/in the bowl to make a soft, slightly tacky dough. Do not add more flour than you need because you do not want a dry dough. After kneading, the dough should still feel a little soft. Poke it with your finger—if it slowly bounces back, your dough is ready to rise. You can also do a “windowpane test” to see if your dough has been kneaded long enough: tear off a small (roughly golfball-size) piece of dough and gently stretch it out until it’s thin enough for light to pass through it. Hold it up to a window or light. Does light pass through the stretched dough without the dough tearing first? If so, your dough has been kneaded long enough and is ready to rise. If not, keep kneading until it passes the windowpane test.
- 1st Rise: Lightly grease a large bowl with oil or nonstick spray. Place the dough in the bowl, turning it to coat all sides in the oil. Cover the bowl with aluminum foil, plastic wrap, or a clean kitchen towel. Allow the dough to rise in a relatively warm environment for 1-2 hours or until double in size. (I always let it rise on the counter. Takes about 2 hours. For a tiny reduction in rise time, see my answer to Where Should Dough Rise? in my Baking with Yeast Guide.)
- Grease a 9×13 inch baking pan or two 9-inch square or round baking pans. You can also bake the rolls in a cast iron skillet or on a lined baking sheet.*
- Shape the rolls: When the dough is ready, punch it down to release the air. Divide the dough into 14-16 equal pieces. (Just eyeball it– doesn’t need to be perfect!) A bench scraper is always helpful for cutting dough. Shape each piece into a smooth ball. Arrange in prepared baking pan.
- 2nd Rise: Cover shaped rolls with aluminum foil, plastic wrap, or a clean kitchen towel. Allow to rise until puffy, about 1 hour.
- Adjust oven rack to a lower position and preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). (It’s best to bake the rolls towards the bottom of the oven so the tops don’t burn.)
- Bake the rolls: Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown on top, rotating the pan halfway through. If you notice the tops browning too quickly, loosely tent the pan with aluminum foil. Remove from the oven, brush with optional honey butter topping, and allow rolls to cool for a few minutes before serving.
- Cover leftover rolls tightly and store at room temperature for 2-3 days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: Prepare recipe through step 6. Place shaped rolls in a greased baking pan, cover tightly, and freeze for up to 3 months. Once frozen, the dough balls won’t stick together anymore and you can place them in a freezer bag if needed. On the day you serve them, arrange the dough balls in a greased baking pan, cover tightly, then let them thaw and rise at room temperature for about 4-5 hours. Bake as directed. You can also freeze the baked dinner rolls. Allow them to cool completely, then freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature, then reheat as desired. If reheating the whole pan, lightly cover and reheat in a 300°F (149°C) oven for about 10 minutes or until warm.
- Overnight Instructions: Prepare the recipe through step 6. Cover the shaped rolls tightly and refrigerate for up to about 15 hours. At least 3 hours before you need them the next day, remove the rolls from the refrigerator, keep covered, and allow to rise on the counter for about 1-2 hours before baking. Alternatively, you can let the dough have its 1st rise in the refrigerator overnight. Cover the dough tightly and place in the refrigerator for up to about 15 hours. Remove from the refrigerator and allow the dough to fully rise for 2 more hours. Continue with step 5.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Stand Mixer or Glass Mixing Bowl and Wooden Spoon / Spatula | 9×13-inch Glass Baking Pan | Bench Scraper | Pastry Brush
- Baking Pan: I prefer baking the rolls in a glass 9×13 inch baking pan because I find they brown a little too quickly in metal. As long as you bake the rolls on a lower oven rack and keep your eye on them, any pan is great.
- Yeast: Platinum Yeast from Red Star is an instant yeast. You can use Red Star Yeast active dry yeast instead. Rise times will be slightly longer using active dry yeast. Reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.
- Flour: You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour. All-purpose flour is convenient for most, but bread flour produces chewier dinner rolls. The rolls are still soft and fluffy no matter which you use. Either flour is fine and there are no other changes to the recipe if you use one or the other.
Adapted from Homemade Bread Bowls and Honey Butter Rolls
Reader Comments and Reviews
I just bought myself a stand mixer and made these dinner buns today. I was surprised how easy they were to make and they turned out absolutely perfect. Will definitely be making these again!
This is my go-to recipe when I need buns to go with dinner. So good!
I’ve never used yeast before and was pretty nervous, but these baked up perfectly! I will definitely make them again.
Could this recipe be made into 8 hamburger size buns?
Hi Sarah Jo, these will make very light and fluffy hamburger or hot dog buns and we fear they wouldn’t support the meat very well. Though you can still certainly try it. You may want to try our bread bowls dough instead. We’re unsure exactly how many either recipe would make, so let us know if you try it!
Love this recipe, made it to much acclaim several times!
Most recently I swapped the unsalted butter for salted, and then rather than adding honey to butter brushed on at the end, I sprinkled some finishing salt on the freshly buttered tops of the rolls. Just an incredible buttery, salty taste.
Great recipe, thanks. I chose to use bread flour, these rolls were deliciously, light and airy with some chew. My family and dinner guests loved them as well.
Great recipe, make it all the time and never fails! Can the recipe be cut in half?
Hi Madelyn! We don’t recommend halving this recipe. For best results, make the recipe as written and freeze any extras– or freeze half of the dough. (Freezing instructions in the notes.)
Madelyn,
When I’m cooking these at home I always halve the recipe (there are only 3 of us). The secret is to take 20g of milk out of the 1/2 cup of milk to make up for extra half of an egg.
Help can’t get the proofing right! I’ve tried about 4 times and the doigh does grow but not up it rises up a bit the poufs sideways then when I go do the second proof it still doesn’t rise much. I use bread flour and measure correctly and I do warm milk and suugar and make sure yeast froths. But I eithe tunder or I’ve proof and can’t seem to get it right
I think adding a little extra flour to the dough could help here; it sounds like the dough is just too wet, so it just rises/expands out instead of up. Try adding another 1/4 cup of flour, about 31g. That should definitely help.
I have made this recipe twice, and have ended up with a texture similar to sandwich bread. How do I get my rolls to be flakier/more airy and pillow soft?
Hi Lynnsey, it sounds like you may be over kneading the dough, which can cause bread to bake up a bit dense without nice flaky, soft layers. Our Baking with Yeast Guide may also be helpful to review. Thank you for giving these a try!
Love all of your recipes but this one was an absolute hit. My Aunt is allergic to dairy and eggs so I swapped the milk for water, the egg for unsweetened applesauce, and the butter for olive oil. I also added some chopped rosemary and did a 50/50 mix of all-purpose and bread flour. I also topped them, before baking, with some rosemary leaves and Malden salt. The rolls were pillowy soft and absolutely delicious.
I do the knead and first rise on the dough setting in my bread machine, then the rest as the recipe says. These are perfect everytime and a family favorite in my house. I brush with butter only when we dont want sweet rolls.
Very easy to make and rolls turned out perfect!! My family loved them!
I have made homemade rolls for several years but this recipe is the best!
These rolls were a Thanksgiving hit! Relatively low effort but tasted lie I slaved away. Even my teenage nieces, who are impressed by nothing, loved these. I used Fleischmann’s yeast and 2% milk because that’s what I had on hand, but didn’t have any issues. I doubled the recipe pretty easily, which was a good thing because they were getting swiped off the table long before we were ready to sit down.
Great recipe, but using the bottom oven rack didn’t work for me. My rolls didn’t brown well and the bottoms of the rolls got overdone and hard. Next time I make them I’ll place the pan in the middle of the oven and also brush the rolls with an eggwash so that they can brown nicely and stay tender. I guessing ovens vary.
I made these rolls for my Thanksgiving table. They were absolutely amazing. I did cut the sugar back to 1 T since we were adding the honey butter. When I make them again, I think I may increase the salt by a quarter of a tsp. These were the softest rolls I’ve ever eaten. So yummy!!
I doubted myself a lot before and during this experience, but the rolls came out amazing! I followed the recipe exactly, except I didn’t have unsalted butter, so I used salted butter. I also opted for the additional butter with a little honey brushed on top. I believe both of these enhanced the flavor. Split open with some butter and fresh out the oven- they were DIVINE! I did not shape them well enough, but they still baked perfectly. I cooked for 26 minutes at 350 due to my oven and then stuck them in for an additional 3 minutes after brushing on some butter. They were super soft, flaky, and chewy. I love this recipe and cannot wait to make them again! Thank you!
I made these for Thanksgiving dinner. They just came out of the oven and my husband said he couldn’t wait for tonight. These rolls are amazing!
Made these for Thanksgiving- they turned out great! You were right about the confidence boost the process gives to beginners. Thanks for the clear directions and explanations about what makes the recipe work.
I mixed the dough using the bread machine dough cycle and then started up from the second rise in the baking pan in a warm location in the balls. Worked perfectly and made the recipe even easier.
This is the first time I’ve had success with a roll recipe and they turned out perfect!!! So delicious. Can’t wait to make them again.
I’ve never made good dinner rolls. Made this recipe today. OMG, exceptional! Light, fluffy, and flavorful. After first proof, very easy to handle and shape. Thank you so much for this recipe! A total keeper!
This recipe made a wonderfully textured roll but the salt was WAY less than it needed to be. I even made it with salted butter a second time and it came out still nowhere where it needed to be. I went back and reviewed the recipe today to see what might have gone wrong and I immediately recalled that you typically want salt in a bread recipe to be 2 percent of the total weight of the flour. So 3 cups of flour here is 360g of flour. 2 percent of 360 is 7.2g, meaning that’s how much salt you should use for this amount of flour. The recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of salt, which is around 5.7g meaning that this recipe is going well under the mark for salt. A teaspoon is 1.6 percent of the volume of the flour, while the lowest you typically want to go is 1.8 percent of the volume of the flour. Bump it up to 1.5 teaspoons of salt and you’re going to be right around 7.3g of salt which is much more in line with a typical bread recipe and shouldn’t result in bland rolls. 7.3g of salt is about 2.02 percent of salt to the volume of flour.
Everything about this recipe was easy and produced really pretty rolls with a beautiful texture. Once I adjusted the salt, it became one of my favorites. I just wanted to leave this review so that anyone in the future who might be thinking about making it goes in knowing that the official recipe is undershooting the normal range of salt in typical breadmaking and that doing a teaspoon and a half of salt will do wonders to improve the only aspect it was lacking in imo.
I’ve made this recipe in previous years and it turned out great. However, this year my rolls did not rise at all. I made the recipe exactly as written and even used a thermometer to heat my milk exactly to the right temperature. My ingredients were also exactly measured out with a scale (my dough was very wet, though, and I ended up adding quite a bit of flour to even be able to handle it). After not rising the first time, I bought some fresh cake yeast thinking that my yeast might have been the problem.. again they didn’t rise. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong or why they turned out last year but not this year.. they sure were delicious, though, when they did turn out.
Hi Katie, I’m so sorry to hear your rolls didn’t rise well this time! As precise as baking is, climate/humidity/altitude can also play a part, so sometimes you can end up with a different result. Do you normally use cake yeast? We typically recommend instant or active dry yeast packets, but if you are used to making these rolls with cake yeast, and bought fresh, then I can’t imagine why that would give you trouble.
Awesome recipe, the rolls came out great the first time. The second batch I made I substituted honey for the sugar and brushed them in a cinnamon butter. A certain Texas restaurant chain ain’t got nothing on these.
This recipe is easy to follow, and I make it for my dairy allergic daughter by substituting soy milk and Country Crock olive oil sticks instead of butter. The rest I do exactly as described. Some words of advice – preheat your mixer bowl by adding very hot tap water and letting it sit while you gather up the yeast, sugar, and you warm the milk (about 45s in my microwave or so)…and always make sure your yeast is foamy after you put it in the mixing bowl and wait 5min. If it’s not, the milk was too hot, the yeast is too old, or otherwise something else has occurred – retry and look for the beige foam to show the yeast is very active. Also note that this recipe calls for instant yeast – if you have active dry yeast, that’s fine, but it may take a little more time to rise and won’t be as vigorous at rising. Allow more time for active dry to rise than instant.
I’ve made this a handful of times and I’m making them up for Thanksgiving right now 🙂 A panful of wonderful rolls is so amazing, thank you! We also love your cinnamon rolls!
I am making the soft dinner rolls but wanted to do part of it ahead. I put the dough, tightly covered, in the refrigerator overnight. In the morning, I thought I should shape them and put them in the pan to rise, but then, looking at the directions, I thought the bowl should have been left to rise before shaping (and then left to rise again). So, I put the shaped pieces back in a bowl to rise to double and then I’ll shape them again. I hope I haven’t ruined them! I think I was confused because the time spent in the refrigerator overnight was referred to as the first rise.
This recipe was easy to follow however mine came out more like biscuits not the rolls in the picture.
Nowhere in this recipe does it tell what temperature to bake at…
Hi Katie, in step 8, it says Adjust oven rack to a lower position and preheat oven to 350°F (177°C). Hope they turn out great!
I followed recipe, the dough rose, I punched down, made the balls, they rose, put in oven and they came out like hockey pucks. So frustrated….
350 for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.
It’s in number “8”.
A M A Z I N G !!!!! I am obsessed with this recipe. My boyfriend loves it tooo 🙂 thank you!!!