Gluten Free Dinner Rolls

The holidays are full of traditions and baking and family and glorious smells.

For Thanksgiving every year, my mom would make chocolate and pumpkin pie, broccoli salad (in a valiant effort to balance all the carbs and sugar) and the DINNER ROLLS. The smell of them baking is so nostalgic for me, and gloriously floods my mind with memories of my childhood.

When I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease my Senior year of high school (over a decade ago, ekk), I kissed good bye to a lot of traditions and baking in general. It was awful. The options for gluten free back then were comparable to cardboard and sawdust. Flour substitutes resulted in gummy or brick-like texture. Heartbreaking indeed.

Fast forward to my post college days, when I moved back home and started my first teaching job AND had access to a kitchen again, I started experimenting with gluten free baking again. LOTS of rough patches (like the time when Corey and I were newlyweds and I wanted to surprise him with chocolate chip cookies…at that time Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Flour used garbanzo bean flour, whew. Have you ever tasted garbanzo bean flour? Please don’t. Needless to say, we didn’t eat the cookies and poor Corey probably thought he had married the worst baker of all time! Bob’s has since then, GREATLY improved their gf flour and it’s one of my favorites.)

Anyways, over the years I have mastered gf cookies and pie crusts and biscuits and muffins, but baking bread or rolls is my most recent venture. This Thanksgiving I made dinner rolls and I died with happiness! Here is the recipe with pointers in the directions, as gf dough is SO different than regular dough!

INGREDIENTS

5 3/4 CUPS ” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Cup 4 Cup Gluten Free Flour

1 TSP xanthan or guar gum (I use this: ” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Pamela’s Not Xanthan Not Guar Baking Binder)

4 TSP dry active yeast

1/2 CUP honey

2 TSP salt

2 CUPS warm water

4 TBSP melted butter

2 eggs (room temperature)

2 TSP apple cider vinegar

DIRECTIONS

This recipe yields about 15-18 rolls, so I use a 13×9 glass Pyrex baking dish. Butter your dish.

In your mixer or Kitchen Aid combine the flour, gum and salt. Mix to combine. In a separate bowl whisk together the warm water (110 degrees), honey and yeast. Cover with plastic wrap and set aside to proof. While the yeast proofs, combine melted butter, eggs and vinegar. Add to flour mixture and stir until combined. Once yeast is proofed, add that mixture to the mixer, and combine on medium speed for 3-4 minutes. I use my paddle attachment.

The dough will be very loose and that is okay! Grab your pan and this ” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>ice cream scoop (this helps, because of the consistency of the dough, to get uniform, round rolls). Use the ice cream scoop to scoop the dough and put into the pan. They should hold their shape. Once the dough is in the pan, dip your fingers in water and round out the tops of the rolls. You may have to wet your fingers several times to get through all the rolls.

Cover rolls with dry towel and place in a warm location to rise for 1 – 1 1/2 hours. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Alright, pop those babies in the oven! And set your timer for 25-27 minutes. Tops should be golden brown and the rolls should have an internal temperature of 200 degrees.

When those darlings are baked, brush the tops with butter. Let cool in pan for 15 minutes, then turn out onto cooling rack and DEMOLISH!

TIPS: Now, with gluten free rolls, they are best to eat the day you make them. They are soft and flavorful! To store, place in a ziplock baggy with no air. If you are reheating the next day, wrap roll in damp paper towel and place in the microwave for 30 seconds.

Happy baking and enjoy!

xo