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These are the best Potato Dinner Rolls. They are easy enough for a beginner baker but are soft, tender and buttery! They use real mashed potatoes for a rich flavor!
I have made hundreds of thousands of these potato rolls (true fact), and I have taught over twenty people to make them. Truth be told, I used to time myself to see just how fast I could shape them perfectly. I got my time down to under 3 seconds per roll shaping with both hands. That’s right math nerds, that is 1.5 seconds per roll!
So trust me when I promise you that, you too, can make perfect potato rolls. This dough is easy to work with and forgiving! So simple that the recipe is based on time. No window-pane test needed.
These roll are not only an enriched potato roll but they are a BRIOCHE like these brioche buns! That’s right, an epic amount of butter is worked into the dough to finish. They are basically everything you love about decadent mashed potatoes in bread form.
I brushed them with plain melted butter but you could use brown butter, black garlic butter, or throw in some herbs like rosemary and sage while melted to add even more flavor. Pair these with my quick vegetable casserole recipe and your side dish game will be on point!
Keys To Potato Dinner Roll Success:
- Plain Boiled Potatoes: You could boil the potatoes with herbs if you’re feeling fancy, just don’t salt the potato water. Salted potatoes + salt in the dough = too salty rolls. I asked a line cook to do me a favor one time by cooking my bread potatoes and he salted the water and threw in some herbs. Annoying, yes. But we had mashed potatoes for the family meal that day, so all wasn’t lost.
- Mashed Potatoes Done Right: Mash those potatoes while they’re HOT! You want them to break apart and start cooling immediately. If you let them cool you will have extra chunky potatoes and they will retain all that moisture trapped in the skins from cooking and your dough will be sticky. You can add a bit of flour to the dough until it is tacky but not wet. This isn’t ideal because your flavor and texture will be slightly off, but many-a-rolls have been saved at the restaurant this way. Trust me.
Potato Dinner Rolls
Ingredients
- 462 g All-Purpose Flour
- 1 tablespoon Kosher salt not table salt!
- 46 g Sugar
- 2 Eggs large
- 2 tablespoons Whole Milk
- 1 tablespoon + ½ teaspoon Dry Active Yeast
- 370 g Mashed Potatoes cooled
- 92 g Butter cold, cubed
Instructions
- In a small mixing bowl, dissolve the yeast in warm milk (approximately 110°); allow to bloom for 10 minutes.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook combine the eggs, potatoes, and milk-yeast mixture. Mix on low speed until combined.
- Add the flour, sugar and salt to the mixing bowl and continue to mix on low speed for 15 minutes.
- Add your cubed butter all at once and mix on medium-high speed for 10 minutes.
- Portion rolls into 65 gram pieces, or divide into 16 equal portions. Spray the counter with non-stick spray and shape each portion into boules (rounds) using your thumb as a guide. Place in greased baking dish for tall rolls or on a parchment-lined baking sheet for flatter, but still delicious, rolls.
- Final proof until tripled in size and light and fluffy. Bake in preheated oven at 350°F for approximately 20-25 minutes or until a dark golden brown. Before serving, brush the tops with melted butter and sprinkle with a little fleur de sel.
Any advice for kneading these by hand?
Hi Siri, Just keep going 😉 Just kidding, start in the bowl until the dough is less sticky, then kneed it on a lightly floured surface. This is a lovely and forgiving dough. You could also autolyse the dough, which a is a fancy bread term for letting it sit covered for 20-30 minutes after the initial mixing. This allows the gluten to start developing on its own. It will speed up the kneading process. You can also do the autolyse followed by a series of several folds. Time is your friend here, so it will take longer but you won’t have to actually knead the dough. I hope that helps! Happy baking. ~Lindsey
Thanks Chef! This sounds similar to what I do for my focaccia. Of course the yeast % is lower in that one.
Will definitely try it out this way. Thanks again! 🙂
Hi Siri! Your focaccia sounds delish, can’t wait for you to try these! Happy baking 🙂
A TBSP and 1/2 of yeast?? NO WAY!!!
This MUST be a type-o
Use 1 packet of active dry yeast = 2 1/4 Tsp or 19 grams of fresh compressed yeast
Rushing fermentation and/or too much yeast destroys delicious bread flavor and causes bread to smell and taste of yeast – – yuck
Not to mention is a bear to work with.
Potato buns, amish dinner rolls and the many variations are delicious!!!
Hi Theresa, There is not a typo. The original recipe is from one of the restaurants where I was the pastry chef and it was developed with fresh yeast. It does have a lot of dry active yeast (not instant). I can assure you that the flavor is all potato and delightful. Hundreds of thousands of diners in NYC agree with me 😉 .
The additional yeast does speed up the fermentation, which in an enriched bread, like this one, doesn’t really matter. The complex flavor after fermentation is masked by butter, potatoes, eggs and a touch of sugar. This is actually an incredibly easy dough to work with and doesn’t even need bench flour unless you are in a very humid environment.
Happy Baking!
What’s the best way to make these into home made hamburger and hot dog rolls or would you use another recipe for that?
Hey Jeff, you can absolutely use this recipe for burger buns and hot dog rolls. In the restaurant I made these rolls 40g and then used the same dough weight to 100g for burger buns. I scored the burger buns before proofing though. You might find this recipe a little light and airy for hot dogs, but I have made these Brioche Hamburger Buns into hot dog buns with much success. They are are little more substantive. Happy baking (and grilling!)