As the weather cools down once again, it is time to do more bread baking. This year, I have been baking more breads with coconut oil, and it has become my new, favorite ingredient. These rolls are very easy to make and bake. They taste delicious when served at lunch or with a honey glazed ham. You can even cut the rolls in half, toast them, and serve them with creamy brown sugar butter.

See Also

Small Batch Rosemary Rolls

Small Batch Coconut Pineapple Rolls

Small Batch Sage Pepper Rolls

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup milk, room temperature
• 1 tsp active dry yeast
• 1-1/2 tsp coconut oil
• 2 tsp honey
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup crushed or chopped nuts
• 2-1/2 cups bread or all-purpose flour

• Prep Time: 90 minutes
• Cook Time: 15 minutes

• Total Time: 105 minutes
• Yield: 6 small rolls

Preparation

In a medium bowl, mix the milk and yeast. Add the coconut oil, honey, salt, and chopped nuts. Stir. Add 1-1/2 cups of flour and mix well. Slowly add in the remaining flour, enough flour to make a dough that follows the spoon around the bowl. Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface and knead for 4 minutes, adding more flour as needed until the dough is soft and smooth to the touch. Place dough in medium greased bowl.

Turn dough over in bowl so that the top is also lightly greased. Cover with clean cloth and let rise in warm, draft-free place for 1 hour or until doubled in size.

Punch down dough. Turn dough out onto lightly floured board and knead for 4 minutes or until the bubbles are out of the bread. Divide dough into 6 small rolls, 5 medium rolls, or 4 large rolls. Place on greased baking sheet, 2 inches apart. Cover and let rise in warm, draft-free place for 45 minutes or until doubled in size.

Bake bread at 375 degrees F for 10 to 15 minutes or until the rolls are golden brown. Remove rolls from sheet and let cool on rack.

Bread Baking Tips:

1. The milk in this recipe can be replaced with almond milk, soy milk, dry milk, or any other type of milk, including goat’s milk.
    
2. The coconut oil in this recipe can be replaced with lard, shortening, butter, canola, or vegetable oil.
    
3. For this recipe, you can use crushed walnuts, pecans, or almond slivers.
    
4. Learn how to make braided rolls with these pictured instructions.
    

1. Learn how to make swirl rolls with these pictured instructions.
    
2. Keep yeast stored in an airtight container and in the refrigerator. Heat, moisture, and air kills the yeast and prevents bread dough from rising.
    
3. Keep the rolls soft by storing them in a plastic bag after they have completely cooled.
    
4. Store flour properly to keep it from spoiling.
    
5. Bread flour has a higher amount of gluten than all-purpose flour. This means that bread made with bread flour will rise higher than bread made with all-purpose flour. You can make your own bread flour by adding 1-1/2 teaspoons gluten to each cup of all-purpose flour you use in your bread recipe.
    
6. There is a milk to dry milk powder conversion table. Use it to figure out how much dry milk to add to the water when replacing the milk in the recipe.
    
7. When honey is added to bread dough, it helps protect the baked bread's moisture.
    
8. To prevent the honey from sticking to your measuring spoon, coat the spoon in a tiny amount of cooking oil.
    
9. Spraying loaves with water while they bake will produce a crispy crust.
    
10. Brush loaves with egg white before baking to produce a shiny crust.
     
11. Brush loaves with milk before baking to produce a dark, shiny crust.
     
12. Brush loaves with butter immediately after baking to produce a soft crust.