Adapted from Cooking with Carlee … this recipe is a mashup of two of her recipes.
A puffy sweet buttery crescent roll that’s WAY better (and healthier) than the crescent rolls in a can. These little rolls are perfect for wrapping up your cocktail wienies or serving with dinner.
In fact, it was cocktail wienies that made these rolls happen in our house. One day we were at Costco and they were sampling little smokies wrapped in crescent roll dough. My boy totally wanted them. I caved and bought him the smokies … and then went to the grocery store and bought one can of crescent dough. He made up the first batch of the little piggies in blankets himself, but he told me the preservatives in the canned dough totally ruined the taste. I said well, then, we’re just going to have to find a recipe and make them ourselves then! And so we did.
Because these rolls contain sourdough, you get the health benefits of sourdough, but they don’t taste sour at all–they’re sweet and buttery with a lovely soft texture. There’s a bit of active dry yeast too in these little rolls to help them poof up more quickly. I made them mini-sized because I thought it would be super cute to have bite-sized crescent rolls, but you can make them bigger if you want.
Another awesome thing about this dough is you can divide it into three, make one of those into rolls for now and wrap the other two in plastic wrap and store them in the fridge for a few days, until you’re wanting fresh crescent rolls again. It’s SO nice to be able to pull out the dough from the fridge and (relatively quickly) bake up some nice hot fresh crescent rolls.
Where to get sourdough starter?
You can buy it or beg some off a friend (because once you’ve started making sourdough, you’ve always got extra starter to use up) or make it yourself … all it takes is flour and water and time! (Don’t discard the starter when you feed your starter like they tell you in the sourdough recipe … use it in your bread, waffles or pancakes … or make crackers or pizza crust. No need to waste it!) … I think a simple sponge would probably work just as well for this recipe, if you can’t be troubled to take the time to make a sourdough. To make a sponge: mix 1 cup whole wheat flour, 1 cup water, 1/4 – 1/2 teaspoon yeast. Mix in a bowl and let sit on the counter for at least 12 hours until active and bubbly.
I used Kerrygold grass fed butter in this recipe which is rich in vitamin K2 and good for your heart. So even though these rolls are all white flour and they are brushed with butter, you don’t have to feel guilty for eating them (as part of a healthy balanced diet).
Once you’ve made the dough and rolled it out into a flat circle, brush it with butter and cut it into 8-12 pie pieces. I cut mine in fourths, and then cut each wedge into three to make 12 rolls.
Roll up from the wide end, place on the baking sheet and brush with butter again before setting in a warm place to rise (a.k.a, proof) for 45 minutes to an hour.
For proofing, I like to turn my oven on to the lowest setting (for me that’s 170F) and then once it’s preheated, turn the oven off and switch on the oven light. This is the perfect rising temperature for bread.
Once the crescents are nice and puffy (about double in size), it’s time to bake … they bake up in just 15 – 20 minutes. Hot, fresh, perfectly puffy, lightly sweet and totally buttery crescent rolls. Ditch the canned crescent rolls! These are SO much better.
My son found another use for these rolls too … he likes to make tuna (mixing tuna with mayo & yellow mustard) and use these little rolls as dippers. He says the sweetness of the dough is just perfect with the salty tuna. I tried one and oh man I totally agree! I had a hard time refraining from eating more. This has become a regular thing at my house now: my boy eats tuna and crescent rolls. Oh, and I have to tell you that my daughter loves the rolls too, especially the mini version. She’s not into tuna and definitely has no interest in the little smokies, just the rolls, plain, with nothing on them.
Print
Sweet Buttery Sourdough Crescent Rolls
- Prep Time: 25 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 2 hours 45 minutes
- Yield: 24 - 36 large or 72 mini crescent rolls 1x
Ingredients
For the dough:
- 1 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
- 1/2 cup warm water
- 1 egg
- 4 oz. (1/2 cup) sourdough starter
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 1/2 – 3 cups bread flour
- 2 Tablespoons melted grass-fed butter (such as Kerrygold)
For oiling the dough: 2 teaspoons of olive oil
For the top: 1 – 2 Tablespoons grass-fed melted butter
Instructions
- Put the yeast, warm water, egg, sourdough starter, sugar, baking soda, salt and 2 cups flour in a bowl or stand mixer with a dough hook. Stir to mix, stopping to scrape the sides of the bowl until the dough starts to come together. Add the melted butter, a bit at a time.
- Knead in a stand mixer on speed 2 (or turn it out onto a floured surface and knead by hand) for 7 minutes, adding a bit flour at a time (as needed) whenever the dough is sticking to the side of the bowl. The dough should pick up all the mess from the bowl, leaving the bowl clean. If hand kneading, it will feel lightly sticky to the touch, but shouldn’t stick to your hands.
- Take the dough out of the bowl and form it into a ball. Brush the dough or bowl with oil and set the dough in the bowl, turning once to coat the dough with oil.
- Cover and let rise in a warm place until the dough has doubled in size, about an hour. While the dough is rising, spray 2 baking sheets with cooking spray or line with silicon baking mats.
- When the dough is ready, turn the dough out onto a floured surface and cut into three equal pieces. To make mini rolls, divide each ball into two.
- Covering the other balls with a towel (or refrigerating for later), take one of the balls and use a rolling pin to roll it out into a circle about 1/4 inch thick. If the dough resists and won’t get to 1/4 inch, cover it and let it rest for 10 – 15 minutes and try again. Brush the flat circle with butter.
- Cut the dough into 8-12 triangular shaped “pie pieces”. Take each triangle and roll up, starting at the fat side of the triangle. Brush the top again with butter. Repeat with the rest of the dough, leaving a couple inches of space between the rolls for them to rise. Cover with a clean towel and set the pans in a warm place to rise until doubled in size (about 45 minutes – 1 hour).
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. Put the pans in the oven and bake for about 15 – 20 minutes or until they are a pretty golden brown. Let the rolls cool slightly before eating.
Notes
The mini crescent rolls are perfectly sized for wrapping up lil smokies (cocktail wieners).
Is it sourdough if you add yeast? I would contend that it IS sourdough because it contains sourdough starter, but if you’re concerned about adding yeast, then leave it out. Rise times will be longer without the yeast and your rolls will taste more “sour”.
RECIPE SOURCE: http://www.sumptuousspoonfuls.com/
© Copyright 2019, Sumptuous Spoonfuls. All images & content are copyright protected. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If you want to publish any of my images, please ask first. If you want to republish this recipe as your own, please re-write the recipe in your own words or link back to this post for the recipe.
9 comments
This is a genius recipe, Ann! Definitely on my to do list! Thank you for sharing!!
Thanks Hadia! I hope you try it … we’ve made them three times now and my kids just gobble them up every time I make them!
These look buttery and flakey. Love it.
[…] Soft buttery sourdough crescent rolls […]
[…] made dinner, it seemed only fitting that I should make breakfast. I had brought along lots of my sourdough crescent roll dough, which travels nicely in a cooler, so I could make a good breakfast for everyone … so this […]
[…] throw away perfectly good starter, even in the beginning stages. Use it to make these buns! Or some crescent rolls or pizza dough … or even crackers. My friends Kathy and Aaron also make sourdough tortillas. […]
[…] ironically, it was my son that requested them today. He has been eating my sourdough crescent rolls with his own special version of tuna salad for the past several months and he’s getting […]
[…] forms of fermenting grain (I’ve made bread, crackers, runzas, French rolls, Brioche buns, crescent rolls … and so much more), plus water kefir, a delightfully fizzy fruity drink (that I […]
[…] our other bread favorites like the Crusty French Rolls, Soft & Fluffy Do-Ahead Dinner Rolls, Sweet Buttery Sourdough Crescent Rolls, Hawaiian Rolls, Sourdough Brioche Burger Buns … and the list goes on … if it involves […]