Homemade orange rolls

I don’t know if it’s my Swedish heritage, but I love sweet rolls. Orange rolls are one of my favorites. Although I love the traditional cinnamon rolls too. My Swedish grama made them, but she didn’t really live long enough for us to enjoy them together. My mom made cinnamon rolls too and I have fond memories of her baking.

Homemade is the best. If you have a good mixer that will knead the dough, they’re easy to make. The ingredients are cheap, and it only requires that you stay around the house for a few hours while they rise twice and bake. But the pay-off is worth it. I always use a mixture of light olive oil and butter, that way I get some good oil in there with the yummy butter. You can use low-fat milk too.

Homemade Orange Rolls

2 cups milk, scalded
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup light olive oil
1/4 cup melted butter
2 tsp salt
1/2 cup warm water
3 eggs
4 pkg yeast or 9 tsp. or 3 Tablespoons
1 – 2 tsp orange zest
8 – 9 cups white, unbleached bread flour

Scald milk, stir in sugar, honey, oil, butter, salt. I usually put it in a pyrex glass measuring cup and put it in the microwave. But let it cool before mixing with the yeast, or you will kill the yeast.

Measure warm water in another clean glass cup, it should be lukewarm to the touch. Add yeast to the warm water. Let it stand about 5 min. to make sure yeast is active. This means it should bubble up.

Pour both mixtures into the mixing bowl. Add 4 cups of flour and mix with dough hook, adding the next 5 cups, one cup at a time while mixing. Let dough kneed in mixer for 10 minutes.

Remove dough from bowl and place in a very large bowl that has been sprayed with Pam or coated with a little olive oil. Cover and let rise until double in bulk.

Remove dough, punch down and roll dough into a rectangle. Sprinkle with a little sugar and orange zest. If you prefer, you can first put a little melted butter on the dough.

Roll dough lengthwise. And cut into 1 inch slices.

Place slices in a pan. You can put them in a cupcake pan or a square or oblong pan. Just be sure to spray the pan with something like Pam.

Let rise again, until double in size. I usually turn the oven to 200 degrees, then turn it off. Then I put the rolls in the warm oven to rise. This is what they look like when they have risen enough:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake for 20 to 25 mins. Check them early to see if they are golden. They should look like this:

Remove from oven, brush on melted butter on the tops.

Orange Icing for Orange Rolls:

2 cups powdered sugar
3 Tablespoons orange juice
Mix, adding more milk for desired consistency

Drizzle icing on top of rolls.