The Original Recipe

This recipe is directly inspired by The Kitchen Coalition’s “handmade sub roll” recipe from a couple of years back! I found this recipe to be so wonderful for the perfect beach sandwich and it has been a favorite go-to recipe of mine this Summer.

After making the original recipe a couple of times, I decided to make some tweaks so that the rolls could be a bit closer to what my family and I love the most. By adding more sugar and dividing the dough into four equal parts instead of six, I was able to mimic the flavor of the perfect sweet Hawaiian roll while also making the rolls wide enough so that we could really load those beach sandwiches up with all the good fixins. These rolls are also delicious a couple of days later when you slice them in half, toast them on both sides in a sandwich press, and then fill them with lettuce, tomato, and chicken salad.

Maggie Banko

Perfectly Soft Sub Rolls

This recipe is inspired by The Kitchen Coalition's sub roll recipe with a few tweaks to make them the perfect beach sandwich roll for the Summer! By adding extra sugar and dividing the dough into four equal parts, you will have the best sandwich of your life and you won't want to go back to store bought rolls ever again. Trust me.

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 21 minutes mins

Rising Time 2 hours hrs

Total Time 2 hours hrs 41 minutes mins

Servings: 4 10″ rolls

Course: Main Course

Ingredients Method

Ingredients

  

For the Dough

• 450 g bread flour Always weigh your ingredients when making this recipe! This will ensure that the rolls turn out perfect every time.
• 2 tsp fine salt 12g
• 245 mL warm whole milk I warmed my milk to 104℉
• 7 g active dry yeast This is one packet of Fleischmann's Active Dry Yeast
• 45 g granulated sugar I added a little extra sugar compared to the original recipe to give these more of a Hawaiian roll taste
• 2 room temperature beaten eggs
• 3 tbsp cold cubed butter I recommend slicing smaller cubes as you don't want to add large pieces of butter to the dough.

For the Egg Wash

• 1 room temperature egg white
• 1 tbsp water 15mL

Method

 

For the Dough

1. In the bowl of your stand mixer, whisk together the bread flour and salt. Set aside.
2. In a separate microwave-safe bowl, warm the milk to about 104℉ (no warmer than 108℉ and no cooler than 90℉). Add the granulated sugar and active dry yeast, give it a gentle mix, and set the bowl aside for 5-10 minutes while the yeast blooms. You'll know the yeast is ready when its foamy/bubbly at the top of the milk.
3. In a separate small bowl, beat the two room temperature eggs.
4. Next, add the dough hook attachment to the stand mixer, pour the yeast/milk mixture as well as the beaten eggs into the flour mixture and mix on low speed for ~3 minutes until the dough starts to form. You will need to scrape the bowl down with a rubber spatula halfway through this first mix!
5. Add the cold cubed butter and mix on low speed again until the butter is fully incorporated (this is why you want small butter pieces! If you slice the cubes too large, they will take a long time to mix into the dough and you don't want to overwork the dough!). If the dough is sticking to the side of the bowl too much, add bread flour 1 tsp at a time until it's not too sticky.
6. Lightly flour a clean counter with bread flour and place the dough on top of the counter. Punch the dough down a few times to flatten it out a bit and then roll it up into a tight ball.
7. Add the dough ball to a well-oil bowl, cover the bowl with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel, and set aside for 1 – 1.5 hours for the first rise (The dough should double in size and the rising time depends on the temperature of your kitchen as well if you let the yeast bloom enough. The rising time in a warmer environment will not take as long as it will in a colder environment.)
8. After the first rise, clean and flour the counter again and place the dough ball back on the counter. Divide the dough into 4 equal balls (use a kitchen scale for this step so that you know they're all equal and will bake evenly!)
9. Next, roll each dough ball out to 9" in length x 7" in width.
10. Tightly roll the dough up starting at the long side and then place the rolls seam-side down on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet.

For the Egg Wash

1. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the egg white and water. Gently brush the tops of each roll with the egg wash so that they are lightly covered (don't add too much as you don't want the tops to be too dark after baking. You will have some egg wash leftover.)
2. Using a very sharp knife or a clean x-acto blade, score the dough in three parts along the top of each roll. Please don't cut too deep! Just a light score on top is perfect!
3. Fully cover the baking sheet with a kitchen towel or another baking sheet (I like to use another baking sheet so that the towel doesn't touch the dough)
4. Allow the dough to complete the second rise while the oven preheats to 400℉. This second rise takes 30 minutes.

Baking

1. Lastly, bake the rolls at 400℉ for 21 minutes until the color on top is exactly as shown in the above photo. The baking time may vary depending on your oven so be sure to keep an eye on the rolls at the 15-minute mark. The color on top will also vary depending on how much of the egg wash you added!
2. Allow the rolls to cool completely before slicing for sandwiches!