This is twice now that I have not been betrayed by yeast. The first was the mall pretzels I made last year. Dang if they didn’t turn out perfecto! This time, it was rolls. Sweet orange rolls to be exact. A recipe I downloaded from Averie Sunshine that I printed out in the fall, which has been sitting on my kitchen counter for 4 months. They were…well just look! WOWWY.

One cannot imagine how I waited to make these rolls. The recipe just laid there, languishing, ignored, forgotten…

“Can I throw this away?” My husband gently asks while cleaning the dishes, and trying to clear my clutter week, after week, after week.

“No!!!” I scream just a bit too loudly, leaping across the kitchen to rescue this poor little piece of paper that is crimped and stained and by all rights looks worse than most things I throw away. And he doesn’t ask why because he already knows I’m a psycho if anyone touches stuff in my kitchen.

I have been trying to find the time, and the courage, to make her rolls for too long. I must break through my belief that yeast is my enemy, and forge ahead. Luckily, her instructions are always detailed, and spot on. So by following the recipe TO THE TEE, my rolls did indeed rise to the occasion.

I grew up eating those spooky Pillsbury orange rolls. They were good in that, “it’s covered in frosting and I don’t know any better,” kind of way. And if you didn’t eat them all within 2 hours, they turned mealy and mushy and firm. Ick.

If I’m going to fall off the wagon and eat sugar, I’m going to go for it. In this way, I rationalize, I am mitigating my treasonous munching, with a triumph over a fear of a little organism.

Really? Well, I don’t care if it doesn’t make sense to you. I made them anyway.

And oh, what a triumph it was. I gotta say, slathering that square of dough with butter…and then marmalade…and THEN brown sugar, made me feel criminal. I should check tomorrow to make sure my photo isn’t hanging in the post office. But perhaps if I took a tray of these little golden goodies with me, they’d lower my status from felon to friend.

Seriously, you can tame anyone and anything with these beauties.

I have included the link to her recipe here and above, but I should let you know some things I did a bit differently. It is a very short list.

First, I found that I cut the rolls too thick. (I made 12 of them. 16+ would have been fine.) For rising and cooking consistency I think a height of not more than about 3/4 inches is best. Mine were a little taller which meant that when I cooked them, the rolls in the middle were not quite done and the edges were ever so slightly brown. NOTHING that made them even remotely inedible, of course, but I couldn’t have won any awards for consistency.  Next, I found that I needed lots more glaze than the recipe called for. Yeah, more sugar. Just make double. Go for it.   Also, I found the foil to be a bother. It stuck even with lots of oil. I’m going to try them directly on the non-stick pan I have and see what happens. And finally, they really did change consistency by being refrigerated over night. I HIGHLY recommend, as Averie does, that you make them and cook them right away. It’s just too yummy not to.

Enjoy the photos. I’ll be in the back, eating my way through the tray of triumph!