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Thanksgiving: Butter Fan Rolls

Source of Recipe

From "America's Test Kitchen Thanksgiving Playbook"


Recipe Introduction

"For our Butter Fan Rolls, we mixed and briefly kneaded the dough and let it rise. Then we punched it down, rolled it out, cut it into strips, stacked the strips, nestled them into muffin cups, and let the dough rise again. We found that we needed to bake the rolls on the upper-middle oven rack, away from the heating element, for gentle, even baking. In the end, a little easy countertop construction and proper oven placement gave us delicious rolls that were fun to pull apart and eat. Plan ahead: This dough takes about 3 hours to rise before it can be baked. Do not overflour the counter when rolling out the dough in step 3, and use a bench scraper to square off the edges of the rectangle."

List of Ingredients

â—¦ ¾ cup warm milk (110 degrees)
â—¦ ¼ cup (1 ¾ ounces) sugar
â—¦ 1 large egg plus 1 large yolk, room temperature
â—¦ 1 tablespoon instant or rapid-rise yeast
â—¦ 3 ½ cups (17 ½ ounces) all-purpose flour
â—¦ 2 teaspoons salt
â—¦ 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces and softened, plus 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted


Recipe

Combine milk, sugar, egg and yolk, and yeast in bowl of stand mixer and let sit until foamy, about 3 minutes. Fit stand mixer with dough hook, add flour and salt, and knead on medium-low speed until dough is shaggy, about 2 minutes.

With mixer running, add softened butter, one piece at a time, until incorporated. Continue to knead until dough is smooth, about 5 minutes. Transfer dough to greased large bowl; cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and let dough rise at room temperature until doubled in size, about 1 ½ hours.

Grease 12-cup muffin tin. Press down on dough to deflate and transfer to lightly floured counter (do not overflour counter). Divide dough in half with bench scraper. Roll one half into 15 by 12-inch rectangle with long side parallel to counter's edge. Using pizza wheel, cut dough vertically into six 12 by 2 ½-inch strips. Brush tops of 5 strips evenly with 1 tablespoon melted butter, leaving one strip unbuttered. Stack strips squarely on top of one another, buttered to unbuttered side, finishing with unbuttered strip on top.

Using sharp knife, cut stacked dough strips crosswise into 6 equal stacks. Place one stack, cut side up, in each of 6 muffin cups. Repeat with remaining dough half and 1 tablespoon melted butter. Cover muffin tin loosely with plastic and let dough rise at room temperature until doubled in size, 1 ¼ to 1 ½ hours. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees.

Bake until golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes, rotating muffin tin halfway through baking. Brush rolls with remaining 2 tablespoons melted butter. Let rolls cool in muffin tin on wire rack for 5 minutes. Remove rolls from muffin tin and transfer to wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Makes 12 rolls