Fannie Farmer’s Parker House Rolls Recipe (2024)

Hi,
I'm hoping someone could help me! I'm making this for Thanksgiving and given all the other stuff to make, I'm hoping to do most of the work the night before. Would it be better to bake the night before and reheat it on thanksgiving? Or to do the last rise (after shaping) in the fridge over night? Thank you!

I'd recommend the latter: do the last rise in the fridge overnight then bake the morning of. Freshly-baked is best!

My Aunt Eloise made these very rolls for Sunday dinner every week for decades. With part of the dough, she would cut out rolls in animal shapes for the children. All this bread-making would take place on Saturday nights after she had worked all day. And somehow, on Sunday morning she found time to teach a children's Sunday School class before going home to get lunch on the table for up to 20 people. These rolls are wonderful. Thanks for the reminder.

Letting it rise in fridge makes a fluffier bread with better crumb and flavor, plus freshly baked bread is really special at a big family meal. For what its worth.

There is nothing finer than these rolls dipped in the jus left in the platter by the Sunday Roast Beef! What a memory. I can see the yellowish copy of Fannie Farmer sitting on a shelf in my mothers kitchen. The only one she owned until I started cooking as a teenager and borrowed a copy of Betty Crockers' Picture Cookbook from the library. I later bought a copy, which I still have. Marked $3.75 from Hutchinson's Book Store in New Bedford Massachusetts.

This is a beautiful roll recipe. They come out light and fluffy, the exposed edges of the fold getting beautifully crispy and golden brown, while the interior of the fold is buttery and soft.I would suggest using salted butter to brush on the rolls, and possibly a light sprinkle of flaky sea salt such as Maldon. The first time I made these, they came out beautifully but needed a little salt.

Anyone know if this is supposed to be/has to be whole milk?

This sounds like the recipe my mother used to make her out of this world Parker House rolls. Nothing better the day after Thanksgiving or Christmas to make little sandwiches filled with turkey and homemade cranberry relish! Mama was a dedicated bread maker and made whole wheat bread every week. Her cinnamon and sugar loafs were always a treat, and I ate the last one she made that I found in the freezer when I was closing her home.

These were delicious. I substituted 1C whole wheat flour and 1T bran just because that's the way we "roll" here. They were very easy to put together. I made them the day of without any problem.
It made a ton of rolls so I saved some dough for later. This morning I used it to make quick cinnamon rolls and it worked perfectly.

It's the last rise.

Put them in immediately, before rise. Let them stand 2-3 hours at room temperature until puffed then bake!

Whole milk is best, but you won't notice a huge difference if you use low-fat.

For yeasted dough they need to rise in a warm environment. That may have been what went wrong. Most ovens have a proofing mode that you can use as a warm environment to proof. If your oven does not the temp is 100 F. I hope this helps next time.

Excellent! Will be making these for all gatherings!

Can gluten-free flour be used in this recipe? I have Thanksgiving guests coming who can't eat gluten but I hate giving up on bread!

These were delicious! It was a wonderful dough to work with. Expect a plain white bread roll, nothing fancy.I did through step #7, then fridged overnight. I brought them to room temp about three hours before baking them. I baked them as we were cutting the turkey, etc, so served them right out of the oven, but they were good the next day, too. An improvement would be to state what size rectangle to roll out, better than saying 1/3 inch high. I hand-rolled scraps into more rolls.

These were just OK... satisfying, but not earth-shattering. The part where you roll out the dough seems to make it denser, even with the extra rise. I'm wondering what these would taste like without the rolling out part. I agree with a previous commenter that the cloverleaf rolls (NYT cooking recipe) is both easier and tastier to do.

It calls for “white flour” — is that bread or all purpose?

Sorry if this has been asked before, but can I go to step 4 and then chill for 24 hours before rolling out etc.?

I always thought that these rolls lacked flavor? What am I doing wrong?? When I made the Cloverleaf rolls, those came out better.

Good but don’t skip the melted butter for the last step.I added a few pinches of flaky salt as well.

1) These are delicious first out of the oven but the decline is steep -- make sure that you bake them immediately before serving to a crowd as this recipe makes quite a few2) It seemed like a shame to waste the strands of risen dough around the cut-out rolls; on their own baking sheet they made delicious breadsticks3) Coaxing the rolls to fold onto themselves and stay that way was difficult; I folded them unevenly and left the longer half on top to compress the other

Has anyone made this by just shaping the dough into balls instead of rolling and folding? How did that turn out?

Has anyone tried this in a bread machine?

The crust and crumb of the rolls came out like biscuits. Not sure what I did wrong. But I spent all day on biscuits. Disappointing. But I will try again in 6 mons or so. Anyone with any thoughts, please comment. Thank you!!

This was my first time using yeast and it seemed like a really easy recipe to begin my adventures into breadmaking. These were a hit over the holidays and also froze nicely and are still being eaten :)

These were good but they took so long to make!

I didn't follow the instructions precisely because I don't have a mixer. They turned out well. A mixer with a dough hook would have made them much much better.