Sweet Dinner Rolls

Where do your thoughts wander when they get a chance to get and let loose? Positively speaking, I mean. Negativity is a journey in and of itself that I don’t want to focus on for this post. Instead, why not tell some of the things you actually *like* to daydream about? Things that will put you in a good mood by just thinking about them.

Personally, I can name about three main subjects my own mind gravitates towards that put me in my happy place.

The people that I love are right at the top, for obvious reasons. The next two are my creative outlets: writing and cooking. I’m kinda shy about talking my writing and since this is after all a food blog, let’s just focus on that.

It’s hard for me to try and estimate how many times a day my thoughts will go to cooking or baking. Too hard to even really try, so I won’t. But it’s a lot. I think about what I’ve already cooked or baked. I think about what I want to cook or bake. Then, I think about how I want to cook or bake it. I start planning the things I need to get from the grocery store, timing out when I’m going to cook or bake throughout the day. I have to decide if it’s something I want to blog about it. If it is and it’s winter, I also need to factor in time enough to take pictures before it gets dark.

Quite a bit of thought goes into every post I share here, and this one was no different.

Alright, so boom: I was sitting in a hard, wooden, and very uncomfortable chair waiting for my niece’s preschool to get out so I could pick her up. My mind wandered to bread baking–a very common place it likes to visit. I started thinking about types of shapes that I could mold it into that would both photograph well and be different than what I’d done before on the blog.

I’ve done scrolls. I’ve done knots. I’ve done flowers.  Crescents, wreaths, scrolls, skulls, sticks. I’ve made twisty, elaborate, shaped loaves. I’ve made tear and share batches, as well as plain, round rolls.  I’m not trying to blow my own horn, I’m just saying all this to emphasize that it takes some imagination for me to come up with something new for me to do so far as bread shaping is concerned.

I’m not exactly an amateur baker, but I’m not sure I’d call myself an expert either. So when I’m planning out my next baking projects, I try and make sure that my plans don’t get too ‘lofty’ to the point where it’s something I’m not able to execute. There are some bread bakes I’ve seen that are far and beyond anything I’m currently capable of–they’re made by truly spectacular, talented bakers that are goals for me. The things I do are relatively simple to do, but I aim to still make them pretty.

Hand to God, that’s literally how I came up with these. The dough is simple to put together and the rolls themselves are easy to assemble. And yet,(if I may say so myself) they still look pretty good.

I’ve actually been making these rolls for years, except I’d just been shaping them into simple balls and letting them be dinner rolls in the cast iron skillet. I’d like to emphasize that if you want to try this recipe, but the shaping intimidates you, it’s ABSOLUTELY fine to forgo the shaping altogether. After the first rise, just portion the dough into regular balls, arrange them in a cast iron skillet/cake pan/or 13×9 baking dish and bake them that way. They’ll still be fantastic.

The shape of the rolls is really just two pieces of dough that I rolled into scrolls. I then laid one of the scrolls on top of the other and nudged the coils close to each other into a ‘square’ shape. By the time they proofed and baked, it looks like they’re intricately woven and what not. These bake up puffy and fluffy on the inside and as the title suggests, they are on the sweeter side. They’re a huge favorite here in our spot, and if you decide to try them I have a feeling they’ll become one in yours too.

Linking up this post to Fiesta Friday #197, co-hosted by  Laurena @ Life Diet Health and Trupti @ My Culinary Saga.

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