Mom’s Homemade Buns

My Mom’s Homemade Buns are the perfect dinner roll for any occasion! Incredibly soft and fluffy, use all purpose or whole wheat flour, make a big batch and freeze for later.

This recipe is long overdue here, even though I just made my first batch of my Mom’s Homemade Buns a couple weeks ago.

My mom has been well-known for a few reasons for as long as I can remember.

These Chocolate Chip Cookies are one of them.

These Double Chocolate Cookies, (Almost) No Bake Pineapple Squares, and these Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies are some other reasons.

It took me entirely too long to ask my mom for her recipe for homemade dinner rolls, so once I snagged it and made them for the first time, I knew I had to share it right away!

I had to tweak my Mom’s recipe a little bit — swapping her original lard for butter (you can swap it back if you like or use shortening!), and increasing it to be a nice even amount when I halved the recipe.

I didn’t find that the extra butter made much of a difference, so I’m sticking with it!

This recipe makes 22-24 buns, depending on how large you make them. You can easily double the recipe and save some for later! See my tips below for storing these homemade buns after you’ve made them (although there might not be many left 😉 )

Can I bake these buns in a 9×13″ pan?

I know that most dinner rolls are taller, and baked closer together in a pan with higher edges, like a 9×13″ pan.

We always called them simply “buns” growing up, and we ate them with everything 😉

You can absolutely bake this recipe in a 9×13″ pan if you are going for the same look and height. For this recipe, you will likely need two 9×13″ baking pans and can put 12 rolls in each pan.

The baking time shouldn’t change.

Can I use whole wheat flour for these dinner rolls?

You can definitely use whole wheat flour for this recipe, and I do now all the time when I am making them for our family.

I prefer to first test a recipe with all purpose flour, to see how using whole wheat flour might change it, but we tend to eat mostly whole grains and whole wheat breads.

You can start with 2-3 cups of whole wheat flour for a light whole wheat dinner roll, or use up to 100%.

When I make these for our family, I tend to stick with 50-75% whole wheat flour. I find adding even a bit of all purpose flour makes them fluffier than 100% whole wheat flour.

Use this homemade bun dough for these recipes as well:

This homemade yeast dough is extremely versatile! You can easily make a big batch of dough, bake some plain buns, bake a few cinnamon buns, make some breadsticks, etc. — the options are endless!

By doing it this way, you can make a small batch of many different recipes, which is great if you’re cooking for a small family or you’re an individual.

Here are a few recipes that this dough would work great in:

• Monkey Bread recipe
• Glazed Lemon Monkey Bread 
• The BEST Cinnamon Buns Recipe
• Cinnamon Roll Bites

How to store homemade buns:

Keep at room temperature:

These buns will keep at room temperature in an airtight plastic bag for 4-5 days. I will warn you though — they’re so delicious fresh out of the oven that you might find they don’t last that long!

How to freeze buns and bread:

We often freeze some of these for later, otherwise we would eat buns for every meal and nothing else!

Let cool completely — I usually let mine sit for 4-6 hours on a wire rack on the counter. Place in an airtight plastic bag and freeze up to 3 months.

To thaw, place on a plate lined with paper towel to absorb any extra moisture and let sit at room temperature for an hour or two. You can also thaw at a low temperature in the microwave.

What to serve with homemade dinner rolls:

We love having a side of these homemade buns to dunk in soup and chili! Here are a few of our favorites:

• Cabbage Soup Recipe
• Chicken Gnocchi Soup
• Stuffed Pepper Soup
• Crockpot Potato Soup
• Sausage Tortellini Soup