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ROLLS (made from risen dough)
No. 1.--Take a lump of the dough, divide it into small balls the size of an orange, put these into patty-pans, and set them before the fire for ten minutes to rise. Put them into the oven, and bake them till done enough. When nearly cold grate off the outer crust. Time to bake, fifteen to twenty minutes. No. 2.--Take a piece of dough the size of a small loaf. Work into it a slice of butter, lard, or sweet dripping, and one egg. Knead it well, and make it into rolls three inches long and an inch thick. Lay these side by side in a buttered dish, and put them into a quick oven. Do not open the oven-door for a quarter of an hour, then brush the tops of the rolls over with milk, bake them five minutes longer and they will be done enough. Time to bake, twenty minutes.
Both versions assume you already have a batch of ordinary risen bread dough on the bench — this is a page about what to do with the last of it, not a formula from scratch.
- Quantities are by eye"A lump of the dough" and "a piece the size of a small loaf" are not convertible with any precision. Treat the second version as roughly 1 to 1 1/4 lb of dough, into which the butter and egg are worked; that yields about ten rolls.
- Patty-pansSmall individual tins, closest to a modern muffin or cupcake tin. A ball "the size of an orange" is far too large for one cup — around 2 oz of dough per hole is the working size, or use a shallow tart tin if you want the wider Victorian shape.
- A quick ovenConventionally read as somewhere in the region of 400-450F. The first version gives no temperature at all; 425F is a reasonable choice for those too, and the stated fifteen to twenty minutes should hold.
- Enriching a lean doughWorking butter, egg and fat into dough that has already risen once knocks the gas out and slows the second rise. Knead until the fat is fully absorbed and the dough is smooth again, then give the shaped rolls 30 to 45 minutes in a warm place rather than the ten minutes before the fire the first version allows.
- Sweet drippingFresh, unrancid fat saved from roast meat, usually beef; "sweet" here means not off, not sugared. Butter or lard both work; the recipe gives no quantity, but about 1 1/2 oz to a pound of dough is a reasonable reading of "a slice".
- Keeping the door shutThe instruction not to open the oven for a quarter of an hour is the one that matters. These rolls rise hard in the first minutes and a draught of cool air collapses them before the crumb sets.
- The milk washBrushed on near the end, milk gives a soft, matte, pale-gold top rather than the gloss of an egg wash. It will also soften any crust that has already formed, which is the point.
- Grating off the crustAn outdated finish. Version one has you grate the baked surface away with a rasp to leave a pale, soft-skinned roll, a fashion of the period. Skip it unless you want the effect; the rolls are better left whole.
- Baked side by sideLaying the rolls touching in a buttered dish makes them rise upward and stay soft where they meet, like a modern pull-apart batch. Space them if you want crust all round.
In a household that baked its own bread, rolls were what the cook made from dough already proved for the loaves, sometimes plain, sometimes enriched with an egg and whatever fat was to hand. "Sweet dripping" as a stated alternative to butter is a reminder that roasting fat was a kept and valued ingredient, skimmed, clarified and stored in a jar rather than thrown out.