Madtown Mama's Sweet Rolls With Potatoes and Honey

I came up with these last night, and they're quite tasty, so I'm sharing the love with y'all. I have found that it's really easy to impress people by making homemade bread. They think it's difficult or complicated, though it's actually not. Bread-making isn't nearly as tricky as other baking, like cakes and pies, where precise measurements and mixing times significantly affect the outcome. Sometime I may even do a bread-making tutorial with pictures and everything, if there's interest (though I know there are bread-savvy folks - Steph and Joe among them! - who read this blog.)

(Note: This recipe makes at least 40 rolls. If you don't want that many, just halve the ingredients.)

Ingredients:
2-4 mashing potatoes, like yellow wax potatoes
3/4 c. milk
4 T. unsalted butter (1/2 of a stick)
1 t. salt
1 c. water
2 T. yeast
2 eggs
1/4-1/2 c. honey (depends on how sweet you like it!)
bread flour - I honestly don't know how much, maybe 4-6 cups

Instructions:
1. Cook the potatoes in boiling water 15-20 minutes, or until soft. Let them cool, then peel and mash them. You ought to have about 1 or 1.5 cups mashed. If you prefer no lumps, you can stick them in a blender with some of the water.

2. Heat the milk and butter together until the butter is almost melted. Don't let the milk boil unless you like milk skin. (ew)

3. Mix the milk/butter mixture with the mashed potatoes and salt. Sprinkle the yeast on top, mix, and cover until it's nice and frothy, anywhere from 10-30 minutes.

4. Add the water, honey and eggs to the potato mixture and beat until smooth, about 1 minute.

5. Start adding flour. At first, just go ahead and dump in a cup or two, but once the mixture is less "liquidy" and more "doughy" you should add just a few tablespoons in at a time. This part takes a while. When it's too hard to stir with a wooden spoon or stiff spatula, get in there with your bare hands to knead it. This just involves turning it over and over, working it like a massage artist on a mission, punching, folding, whatever floats your boat. This is the fun part, and takes anywhere from 10-20 minutes.

6. When the dough is not sticky anymore, but still soft, cover with a wet towel and let it rise until it's doubled in size.

7. When it's doubled in size, punch it down and let it rise until doubled again.

8. Grease a couple of big cookie sheets. To make the rolls, pull off pieces of dough about the size of golf balls and place on the cookie sheets 1.5-2" apart. Let rise again (20 minutes?)

9.Bake in a 375 degree oven for about 15 minutes or until golden on top.

Comments

Thorny said…
Oooh. Those sound awesome! And the hubby is a huuuuge fan of potato rolls anyway. We're definitely going to have to give those a try one of these times!
Anonymous said…
I like milk skin.
Steph said…
mmm, good work. can't wait to try them.

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