Freshly baked bread is my absolute favorite comfort food. A lot of times, homemade baked goods go stale quickly since they lack all the preservatives their cousins, store-bought bread, contain. That’s the beauty of this recipe. You can prepare the dough up to 3 days ahead of time and just store it in the refrigerator until you bake it. Or, you can bake a little bit each day and have 2-3 days of warm, fresh rolls on hand. Win, win, win!
I did just that this week. I prepared the dough on Wednesday and baked 12 of these golden orbs of delight to go with my homemade Vegetable Beef Soup. Then on Thursday, I prepared the rest of them up to take to a friend who had recently lamented not being able to eat her Grandmother’s dinner rolls anymore. She deemed them “perfect!”
Easy Refrigerator Rolls
1 cup warm water
2 Tbls. yeast*
1⁄2 cup real butter, melted
1⁄2 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
4 1⁄4 cups bread flour
Combine water and yeast in a large bowl. Let stand for 5 minutes.
With wooden spoon, stir in the melted butter, sugar, eggs and salt.
Add flour, 1 cup at a time and mix to combine thoroughly. I use the dough hooks on my handheld mixer. Do not overwork.
Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, or up to 3 days.
Grease a 13×9 baking pan or two 9-inch cake pans. Divide dough into 24 equal pieces, rolling into smooth round balls.
Place in prepared pan. Cover with a tea towel and let rise for about 1 hour; or until doubled.
Preheat your oven to 375°F. Bake until golden brown, about 18-20 minutes. Best served warm. ♥
*do not use rapid rise yeast
You can easily eat them without anything on them, thanks to all the butter already in them, but I love them with a good, homemade jam.