European-style dinner rolls are different from their rich, tender American cousins. The dough for these rustic rolls is lean and the crumb is open, with a yeasty, savory flavor. But the best part might be their crust — so crisp it practically shatters when you bite into it, yet chewy enough to offer satisfying resistance.
It is this crust that keeps European-style dinner rolls in the domain of professionals, who use steam-injected ovens to expose the developing crust to moisture. We wanted a reliable recipe for rolls as good as any from a European bakery.
Unfortunately, when we tasted our first batch, we found a dense, bland crumb beneath a leathery crust. The flavor was easy enough to improve: We added whole-wheat flour for earthiness (just 3 tablespoons did the trick) and honey for sweetness. Extra yeast opened the crumb slightly, but it wasn’t enough.
The crumb structure of artisan-style loaves is achieved with a wet dough, so we ultimately found success when we upped the hydration of our roll dough. The water created steam during baking, opening up the crumb and making it airier.
For an ultracrisp crust, we came up with a two-step process that mimicked a steam-injected oven: First, we misted the rolls with water before starting them in a cake pan at a high temperature to help set their shape (since the dough was soft, individually baked rolls turned out squat).
Next, we lowered the temperature, pulled the rolls apart, and returned them to the oven on a baking sheet until they were golden on all sides. We do not recommend mixing this dough by hand.
RUSTIC DINNER ROLLS
Servings: 16
Start to finish: Total time 5 hours (Active time: 30 minutes)
3 cups (16 1/2 ounces) bread flour
3 tablespoons whole-wheat flour
1 1/2 teaspoons instant or rapid-rise yeast
1 1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon water, room temperature
2 teaspoons honey
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Nutrition information per serving: 101 calories; 4 calories from fat; 0 g fat (0 g saturated; 0 g trans fats); 0 mg cholesterol; 219 mg sodium; 21 g carbohydrate; 1 g fiber; 1 g sugar; 3 g protein.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 41 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.