Dreamy Olive Oil Dinner Rolls

SCRAPS #11: dairy-free, fluffy, light dinner rolls for days

May 15, 2022

You know that feeling when you're at a restaurant and the waiter delivers hot, moist, tasty freshly baked dinner rolls at your table. Well, now you can have them in the comfort of your home!

Dinner rolls are traditionally made using an enriched dough, full of butter and milk, very similar to brioche. I wanted to challenge myself to get the same moist, fluffy, flavorful dinner rolls without butter and milk. There aren’t many good options for my dairy-free friends or someone looking for a good parve recipe, so I decided to make one.

The recipe turned out to be a success on my very first test, and if you’re a cook or recipe developer, you’ll know that happens once in a blue moon. The crumb was tender and flaky, the buns were ridiculously soft and delicious, the recipe barely needed any tweaking. Don’t worry, if you love butter and milk dinner rolls, you won’t be disappointed. This is a recipe for everyone who loves a good dinner roll.

I credit that success to two things: olive oil (in place of butter and milk) and Tangzhong, a technique popularized by Taiwanese author Yvonne Chen. The technique involves cooking flour and water together, forming a paste, that gets added to the dough. I stepped it up a notch and toasted the flour to bring out its natural sweetness and nuttiness. This will contribute to the subtle nutty aftertaste our dinner rolls will have. It’s the same reasoning as the one behind browning butter and adding it to cookie dough.

So how will a precooked water and flour paste contribute to the final result?

Cooking the flour and water helps the flour retain and hold onto more liquid, by pre-gelatinizing the starches, leading us to the most tender, soft, and moist buns. Not only that, the flour will hold onto the liquid even during the cooling process, so if your average homemade roll will have a 2-3 day shelf life, these ones will stay softer, for longer.

I used extra-virgin olive oil instead of the traditional butter, which gets incorporated in the dough, right at the end. I know some might be tempted to add the oil straight in the liquid mixture, but for this recipe, you have to respect the order of the steps. Adding the oil in the beginning will result in a crumbly texture, rather than the tender, soft, pillowy one we’re aiming for.

I prefer using a stand mixer for this recipe, but it’s totally doable by hand, you’ll need to prepare yourself with some elbow grease and patience, but the reward is worth way more than the effort.

RECIPE

Makes: 22 to 24 buns

Prep Time: 35-45 minutes

Chill Time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes

INGREDIENTS

TANGZHONG (WATER ROUX)

1/4 cup (36 g) all-purpose flour
3/4 cup (156 g) water

DOUGH

2 teaspoons (7 g) dry yeast
1 1/2 cup (352 g) lukewarm water
1 egg
1 yolk
1/4 cup (50 g) sugar
4 1/3 cups + 2 tablespoons flour (645 g) all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon (25 g) kosher salt
1/3 cup (65 g) extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for greasing

EGG WASH

1 egg
2 tablespoons water

INSTRUCTIONS

For the water roux, add the flour to a dry pan on medium low heat. Whisk until the flour turns a light beige color, for about 2 minutes.
- Toasting the flour is optional, but I highly encourage you to do it. It will add a pleasant, subtle nuttiness to the buns, similar to browning butter when making cookies. The flour can burn very easily, so make sure you keep an eye on it.
Carefully add the water over the flour. Whisk, as the water immediately starts bubbling. Cook the flour and water until it becomes a thick paste, for 2 to 5 minutes. Set aside to cool.
Combine the yeast and water in a mixing bowl attached to your stand mixer.
- This can be done by hand, you’ll just need some time and elbow grease, no worries if you don’t have a stand mixer!
Set aside for 5-10 minutes, or until the yeast has dissolved. Add the egg and yolk, and mix until incorporated.
Add the toasty flour paste and mix until incorporated, until there are no more visible large lumps.
Add the sugar, mix again.
Add the flour, salt and start mixing (using the dough hook attachment), until the dough looks shaggy and sticky.
Once the dough clumps up around the mixer, slowly start drizzling a third of the oil while mixing. Once incorporated, add another third. Repeat until all oil has been mixed in.
- If you’re doing this by hand, a good way to incorporate the oil is by squeezing and pinching the dough and oil together using your fingers, it’ll take some time to knead it in, but it’s doable!
The dough will be soft and sticky, that’s good! Working with lightly oiled hands, shape the dough into a ball, by brining all the corners in the middle. Drizzle with oil and proof for 1 hour, in a bowl, covered, in a warm spot, or until doubled in size.
Lightly grease your hands and work surface. Punch down the proofed dough and divide it into smaller, 54-56 gram pieces. You should end up with 22-24 pieces of dough.
Shape each piece of dough into a ball: flatten the dough, bring all the corners to the middle and pinch them together. Tightly roll the ball, on the work surface, with your hand.
Place the balls in a baking dish, leaving a 1 cm space in between the rolls. Any baking dish will do the job, I used three 8 inch square pans. A round or rectangle pan will do the job just as well.
Cover and proof again for 15 minutes.
Heat the oven at 350°F or 175°C.
For the egg wash, combine the egg and water in a small bowl. Mix until there are no stringy egg white bits. Brush the rolls with egg wash. I prefer using my hand here, but a brush will do.
Bake the rolls for 18-20 minutes, or until golden brown on top. If the rolls are browning too fast, cover the top with aluminum foil, this will prevent them from browning any further.
- Very optional, but I like reapplying egg wash half way through baking for a deeper color.
Once cooked, lightly brush the hot rolls with 2 to 3 tablespoons of olive oil and sprinkle with flaky salt. Cover with a clean kitchen towel for 5 minutes, to soften.
Store these in a ziplock bag at room temperature, in a dry spot.