Skillet Dinner Rolls

Quick and Easy Skillet Dinner Rolls are soft, fluffy, and served warm right out of the oven with a brush of melted butter making them the only bread recipe you’ll need to complement any dinner. Plus, using a cast-iron skillet to make these homemade bread rolls means even easier preparation and serving!

Putting freshly baked bread on the table used to be something that only our grandmothers used to do. Nowadays, we just don't have the time. We are always on the go, running from one place to the next, so getting freshly baked bread seems like a mountainous task. But guess what? What used to take hours to make can now be put on the table in just over half an hour, while you preparing dinner for the night! These quick and easy dinner rolls are just that – EASY.

It takes just over 30 minutes to make these skillet dinner rolls from scratch using only 8 pantry staple ingredients. You will spend ten minutes (or less!) mixing the ingredients before a brief rest to rise, so you can work on other dishes or hang out with your family and still enjoy delicious homemade rolls with dinner!

Why You’ll Love these Skillet Dinner Rolls

• The best dinner rolls ever. When you think about dinner rolls, what do you think of? The perfectly golden brown tops. The steaming, warm buttery inside. The fluffy texture. It’s all perfectly reminiscent of gathering around the table as a child. As a kid, bread always was the best part of any meal, after all.
• Unbelievably soft and buttery. Fresh, homemade dinner rolls are guaranteed to draw people to the dinner table – even before you announce the meal is ready! Add in the fun pull-apart-ability of these soft, buttery skillet dinner rolls and you’ve got the ultimate recipe for mealtime success.
• Easy to make for dinner. You won’t believe what a difference freshly baked bread makes when it’s on the dinner table. The smell, the buttery flavor, it all complements dinner in a homey, feel-good way. It’s the extra touch of homemade happiness that brings a meal together on the table.Homemade rolls don’t have to be intimidating. These quick and easy skillet dinner rolls require less than ten steps and just 8 ingredients before popping them in the oven. They’re beginner-friendly and foolproof!
• Ready in under an hour. The entire process to make these rolls requires only ten minutes of active preparation (plus just 10 minutes of rest time) before baking. After 15 minutes in the oven, you’ll have fluffy, buttery, golden-brown rolls ready for the dinner table. This leaves you free to start dinner, take a breather, and kick your feet up as you begin to unwind from a long day at work.
• Serve them for any occasion. Whether you are serving up these rolls on a weeknight during the dinner rush or making them for everyone surrounding your Thanksgiving Day table, you will find yourself keeping this recipe on hand for easy dinner rolls for years and years to come.

Ingredient Notes

To make these quick and easy Skillet Dinner Rolls, you will need to gather some pantry staple ingredients (see recipe card below for full measurements):

• whole milk – using room temperature milk keeps these dinner ultra soft and fluffy. If you want, you can use warm water instead – just make sure the water isn’t too hot or it will kill the yeast and the bread won’t rise. A little above lukewarm will do.
• vegetable oil - you can also use avocado oil or olive oil.
• active dry yeast - you can use the kind from a jar or a packet – either is fine as long as the measurement remains the same.
• sugar - you can also use an equal measure of honey or maple syrup instead.
• salt
• egg - as with any baking project, try to get the egg as close to room temperature as possible before mixing.
• all-purpose flour - you can try swapping for a measure-for-measure gluten free flour to make these rolls gluten-free.
• salted butter - if you’re out of salted butter, you can use unsalted butter.

You will also need measuring cups and spoons (or a kitchen scale), a mixing bowl and whisk or a stand mixer with a dough hook, and a large cast-iron skillet.

How to Make the Best Skillet Dinner Rolls

1. Activate the yeast. In a mixing bowl (or in the bowl of a stand mixer), stir together milk (or warm water), vegetable oil, yeast, and sugar. Let rest 15 minutes until foamy.

2. Add remaining ingredients. Add in 2 cups flour, salt, and egg. Stir until combined (or use a dough hook in your stand mixer to mix until combined). Gradually add in the remaining flour, stirring between each addition until completely combined. 

3. Knead the dough. Knead the dough manually using your hands on a clean surface for 5 minutes, or use the dough hook of your stand mixer to knead for 5 minutes until smooth.

4. Shape the rolls. Use your hands to shape the dough into 12 balls. You may want to roll them on a clean surface for a couple of minutes until they are smooth and tight and not lumpy.

5. Rest. Grease a cast-iron skillet with butter. Place dough balls in the greased cast-iron skillet. Let rest at room temperature for 10 minutes. The balls of dough should almost double in size.
6. Bake. Brush the tops of the rolls with half the melted butter. Bake in a 400F preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes, until the tops are golden brown.
7. Serve. Remove from oven and brush again with remaining melted butter. Sprinkle some dried parsley or oregano on top (if desired) and serve warm.

How to Serve Dinner Rolls

The flavour of these rolls is light and rich, without being too overpowering in taste to take over the entire meal. Simply serve them with butter alongside a meal or drizzle some honey in with butter for a pleasant sweet surprise in every buttery bite.

The best thing about these rolls is that they go with basically any dinner you can think of. From meat and seafood, pasta and rice, and curry and soup, a side of these freshly baked rolls is just the extra bit of comfort you want to serve up to your family and friends gathered around your dinner table. Some delicious dinner ideas that you can serve these rolls with are:

• Creamy Tomato Pasta
• Vegetarian Split Pea Soup
• Creamy Artichoke Dip
• Chicken Marsala
• Salmon Bites
• Cranberry Meatballs

Storage and Freezing Instructions

How to Store

Transfer leftover skillet dinner rolls into a large Ziploc bag, pressing all the air out before sealing. Store at room temperature out of direct sunlight for up to 4-5 days. You can also store them in the refrigerator for up to a week but they will dry out a bit. You can reheat them to add some moisture back in.

How to Reheat

Reheat in the microwave on high for 30 seconds to 1 minute until warm. You can also reheat dinner rolls or in the oven at 350℉ for 10 minutes or in the air fryer for 5 minutes until heated through.

How to Freeze

You can choose to separate the rolls or leave them in one unit, but either way you can transfer them to a freezer bag and freeze them for up to 3 months. Reheat the frozen dinner rolls in the oven straight from frozen to preserve the texture. Just add an extra 5 minutes to the reheating time.

More Bread Recipes

• 30 Bread Recipes with Yeast
• Potato Dinner Rolls
• Garlic Knots
• Green Onion Bread Rolls
• Cheesy Garlic Dinner Rolls
• Homemade Biscuits

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