recipe: pull-apart rolls

This is my favorite recipe for homemade rolls. They're really fun. You eat them by pulling them apart, layer by layer. Also, there is an obscene amount of butter in these things. Which makes them even more delicious, of course.

Pull-Apart Rolls

• 1 package yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 1/2 cup melted butter, divided
• 3 1/2 cups flour, divided
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Turn off when oven comes to temperature.

Boil a small amount of water in a small pot. Place stand mixer bowl on top of the pot for a couple of minutes to warm the bowl.

In warmed mixer bowl, dissolve yeast in 1 cup warm water. Add 1/4 cup melted butter, 2 cups flour, sugar and salt.

Using a dough hook, mix for 1 minute on Speed 2.

Add remaining 1 1/2 cups flour, and continue mixing for 4 minutes.

Place dough in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise in the warmed oven for 1 hour.

Once dough has doubled in bulk, punch down. (Tony helps when bread recipes require the dough to be punched down.) 

Roll dough into a 9-by-12-inch rectangle.

Brush with remaining 1/4 cup melted butter. Slice dough into six 12-inch strips. 

Stack strips. 

Cut into 12 1-inch pieces. Place pieces (cut side up) in greased muffin tin.

Cover and let rise again for an hour.

Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. Cool on wire racks.

I served these rolls with minestrone soup, which we ate after carving our pumpkins.

I based the recipe on one in the recipe book that came with my KitchenAid mixer. The mixer was a Christmas gift last year, and I'm not sure how I ever lived without it. If you don't have one, talk to Santa this year. He can hook you up.