Plain Butter or Garlic Parmesan! Both are fluffy and delicious!
There are crescent rolls that come out of a tube in the refrigerated department at the grocery store. I use them for sure. There’s a time and place for everything! However, if you have a little extra time, I highly recommend you give making these homemade crescent rolls a try
I make them every year for holidays, special occasions and sometimes just to go with our dinner! I love to serve them with homemade butter! They are truly special and worth the effort! …and with this new Parmesan Garlic version, you can choose which you’d like to make: Plain Buttery Homemade Crescent Rolls or Parmesan Garlic Crescent Rolls!
The soft dough mixes together quickly, so that’s easy. The “extra time” part I mentioned is for the rising. This is a very rich dough with a whole lot of butter in it – all that richness tends to slow down the rising, so you need to be patient and make these on a day when you’ll be in the house for a few hours.
For holidays I bake them a few hours in advance and warm them up when we’re ready to eat.
How To Make the Crescent Rolls: Step-by-Step
Mix Ingredients 
Knead until dough is smooth, soft and cleans the bottom of the bowl 
Let rise in bowl – about 1.5 hours 
Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface
Flatten slightly, fold, turn – repeat 6-8 times 
Roll out into 12″ circle, spread on softened butter, cut, and roll up 
Rise again – 1 – 1.5 hours 
Brush on egg wash – ready to bake
Egg Wash-vs-No Egg Wash:
Brushing the rolls with a simple beaten egg and a little water gives your Homemade Crescent Rolls a beautiful golden brown color and a nice shine. Both ways are delicious, but the top, egg washed roll looks gorgeous!
Don’t forget the homemade butter:
Whipped Pumpkin Maple Butter
Spread this delicious sweet compound butter on just about anything! Pumpkin bread, pancakes, waffles, biscuits, french toast, sweet potatoes… It's super easy to whip together and keeps for at least a week in the refrigerator.
Check out this recipe
Make Butter with Your Food Processor
Who knew you could churn your own butter using your food processor? I knew you could make it in your stand mixer, but a food processor makes it all a little neater! It tastes amazingly fresh and light!
Check out this recipe
Homemade Garlic Parmesan Crescent Rolls (or Plain)
Homemade crescent rolls are rich, buttery and bake up fluffy and light! They are truly special and worth a little extra time. You can choose the Plain Buttery Homemade Crescent Roll version or the Parmesan Garlic Crescent Rolls! Both are scrumptious!
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Servings: 12 servings
Ingredients
Dough:
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) salted butter divided
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1 1/2 teaspoons yeast
- 3 tablespoons sugar
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour divided, plus more for rolling
- 1 large egg + 1 egg yolk
- 1 teaspoon salt I use coarse kosher
Parmesan Garlic Butter Filling/Topping:
- 2 tablespoons salted butter softened
- 2 tablespoons grated parmesan cheese
- 1 teaspoon fresh minced garlic
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried parsley flakes or 2 teaspoons fresh
Plain Butter Filling/Topping:
- 2 tablespoons salted butter softened
- 1/8 teaspoon (pinch) salt
Egg Wash:
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoons water
Instructions
Dough:
- Melt 6 tablespoons butter in microwave (about 30 seconds). Add 1/2 cup cold milk to melted butter. Mixture should end up about room temperature.
- I use my stand mixer for this recipe, but you could alternatively mix by hand. Add yeast, milk and butter mixture, sugar and 1 cup of flour to the mixing bowl. Stir together and let sit 5 minutes until yeast starts to activate.
- Add eggs, remaining flour and salt to mixture. Use dough hook to mix and knead for about 3 minutes on speed 2. The finished dough should be soft, smooth and should clean the bottom of the bowl.
- Cover bowl with plastic wrap (no need to grease bowl - should be plenty of butter residue in bowl) allow to rise at room temperature for about 1 1/2 hours. (see notes)
Form Rolls:
- Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or lightly grease.
- On a lightly floured surface, slightly flatten and fold the dough over on itself 6-8 times (helps create layers) then form into a disc shape and roll into a 12" circle, lightly dusting with flour as needed.
- For Parmesan Garlic Rolls: Mix together remaining 2 tablespoons softened butter, Parmesan cheese, garlic, salt, pepper and parsley. Spread the mixture on the dough circle.
- For Plain Butter Rolls: Spread remaining 2 tablespoons softened butter on dough circle, sprinkle with 1/4 teaspoon salt.
- Use a pizza wheel or long sharp knife to cut the dough circle into 12 wedges (like a pizza.)
- Roll each wedge starting at the wider end to form crescent roll shape. Place with tip side down on baking sheet.
- Cover baking sheet with plastic wrap (loosely - so they have room to rise) and allow to rise at room temperature. It will take about an 1 - 1 1/2 hours - they should be puffy and larger in size. When gently touched with your finger, the dough springs back. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. part-way through rising time.
Bake:
- Make the egg wash. Whisk together the egg and water. Brush over rolls. (This gives them a beautiful golden-brown color.)
- Bake for about 18 - 20 minutes or until puffed and golden-brown. If you feel they are getting too dark, you can lay a piece of foil loosely over-top the rolls.
- Serve while warm. You can also bake several hours in advance and rewarm in a 300 degree F. oven for about 5-7 minutes
Notes
Rising/Proofing Rich Doughs:
This dough has a good amount of egg, sugar, butter and salt in the recipe. All these components can cause the dough to rise a little more slowly and not quite as dramatically as some leaner doughs like pizza dough. I let my dough rise on the kitchen counter - I'd say it's about 70-75 degrees in my kitchen most days - For me it's about 1 1/2 hours for the first rise and an hour for the second rise - but lots of factors can affect your rise times: Room temp, dough temp, yeast, weather etc. You may need to go by how the dough looks. It should definitely have expanded and look puffy. You may not get a full "doubled" in size like lots of recipes state. But you want it to definitely get larger and puffy so it has a nice fluffy texture when baked. I recommend letting this dough rise at room temperature. I don't recommend any quick rise methods (placing in warm oven, proofing setting in oven, placing over warm water) as the generous amount of butter in the dough gets too soft and they don't rise properly.Make Ahead Instructions:
Refrigerating the Dough: Once dough has doubled in size, place in refrigerator for 4-hours or overnight. Take dough out of refrigerator. It will be stiff as the butter will have solidified. Let it sit out for 10-15 minutes or until it's more pliable. Continue with forming the rolls. Freezing/Refrigerating already formed rolls: After the formed rolls have risen, you can refrigerate or freeze. To freeze: place in freezer for about 2 hours on baking sheet, then transfer to container or freezer bag. Thaw in refrigerator. I like to let them come to room temperature before baking.Nutrition (approx. data estimated via online nutritional calculator.)
Calories: 232kcal (12%) | Carbohydrates: 24g (8%) | Protein: 5g (10%) | Fat: 13g (20%) | Saturated Fat: 8g (50%) | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 3g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 48mg (16%) | Sodium: 419mg (18%) | Potassium: 68mg (2%) | Fiber: 1g (4%) | Sugar: 4g (4%) | Vitamin A: 410IU (8%) | Vitamin C: 1mg (1%) | Calcium: 32mg (3%) | Iron: 1mg (6%)
Tried this recipe?Share it! Tag @epicuricloud - Please Leave A Comment & Rating Below! TY!
Tina I love these, but I love all of your recipes that I have tried.,& the special ones I have requested from you I have printed and laminated and in a folder. I don’t know if you have tried Cheryls cookies with buttercream icing can you possibly let me know if you have a recipe for the triple Devils food cookies with buttercream icing.These are the softest cookies ever no wonder they’re David’s favorite and I don’t know how they do their icing but you could fix a plate and take to your doctors office or anywhere in the cellophane would not stick to the icing because it is set That good. So you if you have a recipe for the cookies and the icing I would appreciate if you would send it to me thanks in advance for all your tips and recipes I truly appreciate and cherish each and everyone of them thank you.
Carolyn Ellison
Hi Carolyn – Thanks for stopping by! Yes, I have had Cheryl’s cookies – Mary would share them with us at QVC! YUM! I’m not sure what they add to their cookies and frosting to make them so soft and to have the frosting not sticky. I would guess a commercial bakery has access to special ingredients that we homecooks do not?
Hi Tina
I would love the recipe for apple cinnamon cookies
I tried finding it but have not succeeded
Thanks TinaBeverly
Hi Beverly – We made an apple spice cake – Was that what you were thinking? It’s this recipe: Pie Filling Easy Cake (use spice cake mix and apple pie filling) Enjoy!
I haven’t tried this recipe (but I’m rating it as 5 stars because all of the other recipes I’ve made are delicious and I needed to rate this one to submit a comment), but I have a question: For these rolls, it calls for yeast. What kind? Active dry, rapid rise, or instant? I want to make sure I use the correct type. Thank you!
Hi Linda – honestly I tend to use them interchangeably these days. If I use active dry yeast, I bloom it in the liquid. For rapid rise or instant, I just add it with the dry ingredients.