Thanksgiving Vegan Dinner Rolls Recipe (2024)

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Best ever light and fluffy Thanksgiving Vegan Dinner Rolls recipe Italian style, perfect for the holiday table, Christmas dinner and any night of the week. Who can resist afreshly baked bread roll?!

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Vegan Dinner Rolls

Made from scratch with only 5 ingredients, these easy homemade dinner rolls are like a hybrid between a croissant and a brioche. Sugar, egg and dairy-free, fluffy on the inside, golden on the outside with the perfect thin bottom crust, these rolls are simply irresistible .

Recipe Tips

Make sure your yeast isn’t expired!
Use warm, full fat coconut or cashew milk, don’t worry you won’t taste any coconut at all.
The dough should be sticky, slightly stick to the bottom of the mixer bowl but not to the sides.
After the first rise take good care not to overwork the dough. DO NOT KNEAD a second time or your rolls will become too dense. Simply cut and shape by folding the dough onto itself as shown in the how to video below.
Allow the rolls to rise a second time in the same pan you are going to bake them in until almost doubled in size.
The rolls are done when lightly golden brown on top. I cook mine for 15 minutes inside a cast iron skillet on top of my pizza stone that lives in my oven.
Crust Tip: In order to achieve a nice crisp crust on the bottom of your rolls make sure to cook them in a cast iron skillet or pan. It’s very important that you also allow them to cool off inside the same pan after removing from oven.
Brush with olive oil for that shiny golden finish reminiscent of your favorite Italian restaurant.

Thanksgiving Rolls Dough Ingredients

all purpose flour (or bread flour)
instant yeast
full fat coconut or cashew milk
olive oil
sea salt

How to Shape Dinner Rolls

After the first rise of the dough use a serrated knife to cut the dough into 12 equal pieces. DO NOT KNEAD. Lightly oil your hands and fold each piece of dough onto itself tucking underneath until a round roll is formed. Place inside the pan you are going to bake it in. Watch the video below for the step by step instructions.

Make Ahead & Freezing the Dough

Yes you may freeze the dough balls after the first rise and after shaping them into rolls. Once frozen solid you can store in a plastic bag until ready to bake. Remove from the freezer, place inside a seasoned cast iron baking pan and allow to thaw and rise at room temperature until approximately doubled in size. Bake according to recipe instructions below.

Serving suggestions

mushroom gravy
soups and stews
vegan sausage gravy
butter & jelly
mushroom Wellington
vegan white bean soup
cranberry sauce
creamed spinach
black beans
tomato sauce
vegan mashed potatoes
vegan holiday roast.

How to Make the Best Vegan Dinner Rolls

5 from 4 votes

Vegan Dinner Rolls

Best ever light and fluffy Vegan Dinner Rolls recipe Italian style, perfect for Thanksgiving, Christmas and any night of the week.

Print Recipe

Prep Time:10 minutes mins

Cook Time:15 minutes mins

Rise time::1 hour hr 15 minutes mins

Total Time:1 hour hr 40 minutes mins

Ingredients

2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tbsp instant dry yeast
3/4 cup full fat coconut milk warm
3 tbsp olive oil + more for brushing
1/2 tsp sea salt
Fleur de Sel sea salt flakes for garnish

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Add the flour, yeast and salt to the bowl of your Kitchen Aid mixer and combine. Pour in the coconut milk and olive oil.
2 cups all purpose flour, 1/2 tbsp instant dry yeast, 3/4 cup full fat coconut milk, 1/2 tsp sea salt, 3 tbsp olive oil
Using the dough hook knead the dough on low speed for 5 minutes or until a sticky smooth dough forms. It should be sticking to the bottom of the bowl but not to the sides.
Cover the bowl with a tea towel and allow to rise at room temperature for 45 minutes to 1 hour.
Dump out the dough onto your kitchen counter. Use your hand or a spatula to help it out if needed. DO NOT KNEAD the dough again.
Using a serrated knife cut the dough into 12 fairly equal pieces.
Use your hands (lightly oiled if needed) and carefully fold each piece of dough onto itself creating a miniature round loaf (See the how to video above). Place all the rolls in a 10 -12 inch cast iron skillet without touching each other.
Cover with the tea towel again and allow to rise another 30 minutes. (If you live in a cold climate you might need to increase the second rise to one hour or more until the rolls have almost doubled in size).
Meanwhile preheat your oven to 400”F.
Bake your dinner rolls in the preheated oven for 15 minutes or until golden brown on top. Do your best not to overcook them so the center stays fluffy and moist.
Remove the rolls from the oven and lightly brush with some olive oil.
Sprinkle with the sea salt flakes and allow to cool in the cast iron skillet. This step will ensure a nice crisp crust forms on the bottom of each roll.
Fleur de Sel sea salt flakes

Video

Notes

You can easily double the recipe to make 24 rolls by simply doubling the ingredients.
A ceramic pan can be used instead of the cast iron, make sure to lightly oil the bottom or line with parchment paper to prevent sticking.
Add 1 tbsp of fresh rosemary or caraways seeds to the dough for different flavors.
If you happen to have pizza stone inside the oven, feel free to leave it in there and place the pan with the rolls on top of it. This will give your rolls an even crisper irresistible bottom.

Nutrition

Course: Side Dish

Cuisine: Italian

Keyword: dinner rolls, plant based, Thanksgiving, vegan,

Servings: 12 rolls

Calories: 135kcal

Author: Florentina

FAQs

Can you substitute almond milk for milk in rolls? ›

Dinner Roll Recipe Ingredients

If it's not fresh, the rolls won't rise, and they'll be dense and flat instead of soft and fluffy. Almond milk – We use almond milk because it's what we keep on hand, but feel free to substitute any plain, unsweetened milk you like!

Why are my homemade dinner rolls hard? ›

Too much flour, or not the right kind, could be to blame. Dough made only from flour with a high or even average amount of protein (like bread flour or all-purpose flour) can become tough from overmixing. Protein gives bread structure in the form of gluten—the more you mix and move the dough, the more gluten you get.

What bread rolls are vegan? ›

Vegans can eat bread that does not contain animal products or byproducts. This includes breads that only use some variation on flour, water, yeast, and salt including ciabatta, baguette, focaccia, sourdough, pita, and ezekiel breads.

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How can I make my bread fluffier instead of dense? ›

Potato Flakes or Potato Water

Starch helps the dough by trapping the gas from the yeast in the dough and makes the bubbles stronger. This helps the bread to rise and be lighter and fluffier. If you are boiling potatoes, you can use the unsalted water in place of the water in your bread recipe to help out the yeast.

What is the secret to a soft and fluffy bread? ›

Add Sugar

Adding sugar weakens the gluten structure, absorbs water, and eventually makes the bread lighter and softer. As a result, sugar improves the bread's taste, structure and texture. Yeast also eats up sugar to produce carbon dioxide, which raises the dough and makes bread fluffy.

Learn More Now ›

What is the best vegan milk for baking? ›

Among other milk alternatives like almond milk, soy milk and oat milk, soy milk is by far the best for baking. I learned this over the course of several years and many cookies, cakes, muffins and pies. Moreover, some people will tell you that you must swap full-fat coconut milk in for heavy cream or half-and-half.

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What is the best plant milk for bread? ›

Soy milk has the most protein of all the alternate milks, so for baking projects that need a lot of structure (think cakes and breads), this is the best dairy-free option.

View Details ›

What is the best vegan milk for cooking? ›

Soy Milk. With its pale color, neutral flavor, and a protein and fat content that is closest to dairy milk, soy milk is one of the best plant milk options for baking. The protein and fat keep baked goods meltingly tender and encourage dark, golden browning.

What happens if you add too much flour to dinner rolls? ›

Avoid adding too much extra flour to the dough.

These ingredients slow down gluten development and can make the dough a little sticky. Your instinct might be to add extra flour; however, any extra flour will create a denser, tougher roll instead of the light, fluffy, soft dinner roll we want.

Can I use bread flour instead of all-purpose flour for rolls? ›

Flour: You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour. All-purpose flour is convenient for most, but bread flour produces chewier dinner rolls. The rolls are still soft and fluffy no matter which you use. Either flour is fine and there are no other changes to the recipe if you use one or the other.

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What is the difference between dinner rolls and Kaiser rolls? ›

What sets Kaiser rolls apart from other dinner rolls is their unique shape. Thick logs of the dough are crossed and folded into a knot that resembles a loaf of braided challah, but on a smaller scale. Make a batch of these yeasted rolls over the weekend and you'll have delicious rolls for sandwiches all week long.

Get More Info Here ›

Do vegans use yeast? ›

Although yeast is technically alive—it's a single-celled organism that metabolizes food into energy—it's no more an animal than other fungi such as mushrooms. Therefore, yeast is generally accepted as part of a vegan diet.

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Can vegans eat peanut butter? ›

The bottom line. Most types of peanut butter are free of animal products and can be enjoyed as part of a vegan diet. However, some varieties are made in facilities that also process animal products or contain refined sugar that was produced using bone char or non-vegan ingredients like honey or fish oil.

Why is my bread not light and fluffy? ›

For baking light and fluffy bread, it is necessary to choose flour that has high levels of protein. If you choose to use flour with lower protein levels, you'll be left with the bread being dense.

Learn More ›

Does letting bread rise longer make it fluffier? ›

Does Rising Bread Affect Its Texture? For a fluffy bread texture, the key is to let the bread rise long enough.