Bread and Butter

Texas Roadhouse Rolls with Cinnamon Honey Butter

I love Texas Roadhouse.  It is one of my favorite places to eat and one of the reasons is their hot rolls and cinnamon butter they serve.  Someone shared this on FB and I had to save it and make it.  I made it yesterday and I wanted to pass it on because it was so simple to make these light, luscious, hot rolls and butter.  I shared them with family while they were still warm and they loved them.  I’ll be making them again and recommend you try them.

The secret to making good bread is to begin with a good recipe and this is one.  My next tip is to measure carefully and follow the direction exactly.  Do not skip any of the steps and read the entire recipe first. Finally, make sure your yeast is not too old.  It should always be fresh and do not kill it by adding salt too soon or with water or milk that is too hot.  It should never be over 110 degrees F.  

Dough:

2 tsp active dry yeast plus 1 tsp sugar

1/4 cup warm water

1 cups milk

1 Tbsp. melted butter

1/4 cup sugar

4 cups all purpose flour

1 egg

1 tsp salt

Cinnamon Honey Butter:

1/2 cup soft room temperature butter

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/2 cup honey

1 tsp. cinnamon

Biscuits

Add yeast and 1 tsp. of sugar to the warm water (not over 110 degrees F). Set aside.

Place milk in microwave for 45 seconds. Add butter to milk and stir in until butter is completely melted. Check the temperature of the milk; it should be lukewarm, if not then allow it to cool until lukewarm.  If it is too hot, it will kill the yeast.

Once yeast has doubled in volume, add yeast mixture to milk mixture in the bowl of a stand mixer. Add the sugar and 1 ½ cups flour and mix until it reaches the consistency of a muffin batter. Let it rest for 10 minutes.  This is allowing the yeast to do it’s job.

Add egg and salt to the mixture. Beat well. Add 2 cups of remaining flour until the flour forms a soft dough ball on the hook.

Knead dough in mixer with dough hook until smooth and satiny.

Leave it in the mixer bowl, cover and let rise in a warm area until double in size (about 2 hours).  I put on top of my stove and turned my oven on.  Don’t put it over the vent of your stove though or it may begin to bake.  Put on the front of the stove and cover with a dish cloth.  I let it rise for 2 hours using this method.  It may take longer to double if you do not have a warm place to place it.

Once doubled in size, punch down and let it rest for 10 minutes.

Press out the roll dough on a lightly floured surface (remaining ½ cup of flour is for the surface). Shape into a long rectangle. Cut the rectangle in half and then cut each half into 6 pieces making 12 evenly sized rolls.  This does make the biscuits slightly larger than what you get at Roadhouse.  You could probably make 15 with this dough.  Pull the dough into round biscuit shapes tucking the edges under and place on greased baking sheets and let rise until doubled (about 1 hour again on top of the warm oven).  Put a dish cloth on top of them while rising.

Bake at 350 degrees F. for 15 minutes or until golden brown.  It took a little longer than 15 minutes when I made these. 

Because this is a sweet dough, you could also make cinnamon rolls out of it.  Just roll the dough out, brush it with melted butter, and put sugar and cinnamon on it.  Roll it up.  Cut the roll into 1 inch pieces and place on a greased baking sheet.  Again, bake at 350 degrees F. for 15 minutes or until golden brown.  Frost the rolls with a simple butter icing of powdered sugar, butter, vanilla and a little milk.

Butter:

Beat butter with hand mixer until light and fluffy.

Add remaining ingredients and beat with mixer until well blended. Serve with warm rolls.

Now I don’t have to drive over 40 miles to have warm rolls and wait in a long line.  Have a great day and be happy.  May God bless you and yours.