These soft and hearty whole wheat dinner rolls are made with 100% whole wheat flour and sweetened with honey. They have structure, body, texture, and staying power—and hold their own against any white flour rolls.
This recipe is brought to you in partnership with Red Star Yeast.
Baking a batch of whole wheat rolls that are both SOFT and FLAVORFUL feels like winning the lottery. Or, at the very least, winning dinnertime.
What normally results in hockey pucks can finally grace our dinner tables proudly. These honey whole wheat dinner rolls easily compete with (and beat) the tastiest white flour rolls because they taste nutty, a little sweet, and have a bit more oomph in the texture department. Just like my whole wheat bread, this recipe is 100% whole wheat.
Whole Wheat Flour Is Picky
Whole wheat flour is picky and can be difficult to work with. Why? It’s heavy and doesn’t contain the same level of gluten as white flours. This missing gluten poses a problem when it comes to bread making. Many whole wheat bread recipes call for the addition of vital wheat gluten to make up for it, but I don’t keep that in my kitchen and you may not either. Other recipes suggest subbing some whole wheat flour for all-purpose or bread flour—but then the whole wheat rolls won’t be 100% whole wheat. Keeping this in mind (and after a few failed whole wheat dinner roll attempts), I landed on a recipe and method I loved. And I’m confident you’ll be satisfied too.
Admittedly, these whole wheat rolls aren’t as fluffy and tall as their white flour counterpart, but I like their heartier texture. If you crave extra texture in bread, you’ll love my multigrain bread recipe as well. (You can turn that recipe into rolls!)
Behind the Recipe
I adapted this whole wheat roll recipe from my dinner rolls recipe. We use the same exact ingredients, except we’ll swap the flour for whole wheat flour. A few other differences make up for the heavy and dense whole wheat flour:
- Increase the amount of butter. I tested with more butter in batch #2 and even more in test batch #3. 1/2 cup (8 Tablespoons) produced the best tasting whole wheat rolls.
- Use 2 whole eggs instead of 1 egg. The extra liquid keeps the dough a little more hydrated.
- Add honey for flavor.
For best results, use a superior baking yeast: Platinum Yeast from Red Star. This is an instant yeast and my preferred brand. I’m a Red Star Yeast fangirl and use it exclusively in my kitchen because it’s always a guarantee.
Baking with Yeast Guide
Reference this Baking with Yeast Guide whenever you work with baker’s yeast. I include practical answers to all of your common yeast questions.
Ingredients in Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls
Like my regular dinner rolls and even my sandwich bread recipe, this dough comes together easily with 7 basic ingredients. Each has an important job to do, so I don’t recommend substitutions.
- Milk: Liquid activates the yeast. For the softest rolls, use whole milk. Nondairy or low fat milks work too, but whole milk produces phenomenal flavor and texture.
- Yeast: I recommend Platinum Yeast from Red Star, which is an instant yeast blended with natural dough improvers.
- Honey: This sweetener feeds the yeast, increases its activity, tenderizes the dough, and adds a welcome sweetness. And if you love honey in your homemade breads, you’ll enjoy this honey oat bread too.
- Eggs: 2 eggs provide structure and richness.
- Butter: Butter promises a soft, flavorful roll. Make sure you’re using room temperature butter.
- Salt: Salt adds flavor and offsets the sweetness.
- Whole Wheat Flour: We can’t have whole wheat rolls without whole wheat flour!
I recommend using a stand mixer with a dough hook attachment (most stand mixers are sold with it), but if you don’t have a stand mixer, mix the dough together with a wooden spoon and knead by hand. (Feel free to reference my How to Knead Dough tutorial if you need extra help with this step.) Whole wheat dough requires a slightly longer rise time since it’s weighed down with wheat germ and bran.
The Best Shaping Trick
When making dinner rolls, I typically divide the bread dough and roll each piece into individual balls. (Just like with my dinner rolls and honey butter rolls.) It works, but this dough never rolls up perfectly. Maybe it’s because I’m impatient, but some of the rolls end up looking a little scraggly and misshaped. It’s frustrating, especially when I want uniform shaped buns. Ha!
And that brings us to the best shaping trick: Take the risen dough and shape it into a long 9×13-inch rectangle, the size of our baking pan. Almost as if we were making cinnamon rolls, but we’re not stretching the dough out quite that far. It’s pliable, so just use your hands to shape the dough as best you can.
Then, using your pizza cutter, cut into 15 evenly shaped rolls. No individual rolling:
Then it’s business as usual. Loosely cover and allow the rolls to rest and rise one more time. They’ll get nice and puffy in about 1 hour.
Two Delicious Extras
We’ll bake the whole wheat rolls until they’re golden on top and finish them with 2 goodies:
- Brush of honey butter
- Sprinkle of sea salt
You know I’m a big fan of finishing touches and trust me when I say: the brush of honey butter and sea salt are the best. The honey butter soaks into all the cracks and crevices and the sea salt makes that honey flavor pop. You could even take it a step further and make some homemade honey butter for serving with the rolls.
While these whole wheat dinner rolls are soft, they aren’t particularly fluffy. Remember what we learned when we made whole wheat pizza dough? The reality is that whole wheat yeasted dough just cannot rise to the same level as white flour dough. But that’s honestly one of their best qualities. Unlike rolls made with refined flour, these whole wheat rolls are hearty and a little textured.
And if you love rolls with BIG flavor, try these brown butter sage dinner rolls or sweet potato dinner rolls next!
What to Serve with Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls
- Minestrone Soup
- Walnut Crusted Chicken
- Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup
- Baked Chicken Meatballs
- Slow Cooker Chicken Chili
- Baked Lemon Garlic Salmon
Honey Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls
- Prep Time: 3 hours, 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 25 minutes
- Total Time: 4 hours
- Yield: 15 rolls
- Category: Bread
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
Soft, hearty, and sweet homemade honey whole wheat dinner rolls.
Ingredients
- 1 cup (240ml) whole milk, warmed to about 110°F (43°C)
- 2 and 1/4 teaspoons Platinum Yeast from Red Star instant yeast
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature (cut into 4 pieces)
- 1/3 cup (113g) honey
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3 and 1/2 cups (420g) whole wheat flour (spooned & leveled), plus more for kneading/shaping
Topping
- 2 Tablespoons (28g) unsalted butter, melted
- 2 teaspoons honey
- sea salt for sprinkling
Instructions
- Make the dough: Pour the warm milk over yeast in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment. Or, if you don’t have a stand mixer, a regular large mixing bowl. Whisk together, cover bowl with a towel, and allow to sit for 5 minutes. The mixture will be frothy and foamy after 5 minutes.
- On low speed, beat in the softened butter until it is slightly broken up. Then beat in the honey, eggs, and salt. The butter won’t really be mixing into the mixture, so don’t be alarmed if it stays in pieces. On low speed, gradually add the flour. Once it is all added, beat on medium speed until a soft dough forms.
- Knead the dough: Keep the dough in the mixer and beat for an additional 6-8 full minutes, or knead by hand on a lightly floured surface for 6-8 full minutes. (If you’re new to bread-baking, my How to Knead Dough video tutorial can help here.) If the dough becomes too sticky during the kneading process, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of flour at a time on the dough or on the work surface/in the bowl to make a soft, slightly tacky dough. Do not add more flour than you need because you do not want a dry dough. After kneading, the dough should still feel a little soft. Poke it with your finger—if it slowly bounces back, your dough is ready to rise.
- Transfer the dough to a lightly floured surface (if you kneaded with your mixer) and knead it with your hands for 1 minute. Form the dough into a ball, coat your mixing bowl with nonstick spray or olive oil, and place the dough back in and turn it over so all sides of the dough are coated with the oil/spray. Cover the dough/bowl loosely with plastic wrap, a paper towel, or aluminum foil and let sit in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1.5 – 2 hours. Here’s what I do: turn the oven on to 150°F (66°C). Once heated to that temperature, turn the oven off. Stick the covered dough inside the oven and allow it to rise in this warm environment.
- Grease the bottom and sides of a 9×13-inch baking dish. Set aside.
- Shape the rolls: Punch the dough down to release any air bubbles and turn it out onto a lightly floured work surface. Using floured hands, stretch the dough into a 9×13 rectangle (doesn’t need to be exact, it can be a little smaller). Use a pizza cutter and cut into 15 rolls. See photo above for a visual. Round out the edges of the rolls since they stretched a bit as you cut them. Arrange in prepared pan. Loosely cover the rolls and allow to rise in a warm environment again until puffy and double in size, about 1 hour.
- Bake the rolls: Preheat the oven to 375°F (191°C). Bake rolls for about 25 minutes or until they are golden brown. About halfway through the bake time, I like to cover the rolls loosely with aluminum foil so the tops don’t brown too much. Remove pan from the oven and allow to cool on a wire rack for 5 minutes.
- Top the rolls: Meanwhile, mix the melted butter and honey together. Brush over warm rolls. Sprinkle with sea salt. Serve warm.
- Cover any leftover rolls and store at room temperature for a few days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: After dough has risen two hours in step 4, punch it down inside the mixing bowl and cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap. Refrigerate overnight or for up to 2 days, then remove from the refrigerator and continue with step 5. Or freeze the dough for up to 2 months, then allow to thaw overnight in the refrigerator and continue with step 5. You can also freeze the baked dinner rolls. Allow them to cool completely, then freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature, then reheat as desired. If reheating the whole pan, lightly cover and reheat in a 300°F (149°C) oven for about 10 minutes or until warm.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Stand Mixer | Whisk | Pastry Brush | Pizza Cutter | 9×13-inch Baking Pan
- Milk: Lower fat milk can be substituted, but the rolls won’t taste as soft. I strongly suggest whole milk.
- Honey Butter: Don’t leave off that honey butter/sea salt topping. The rolls will be lacking a little flavor without it. I prefer spreading the honey butter on the rolls after they bake as opposed to before they bake. Brushing butter on top of the delicate, airy unbaked roll weighs them down and encourages them to deflate. Best to spread on the honey butter right after baking.
- Reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.
Reader Comments and Reviews
Hi Sally,
Thank you for this most amazing cache of recipes. Every recipe has turned out great except today when I tried the whole wheat honey rolls. They were dense and crumbly and I have no idea why.
Few questions- is the milk yeast mixture as frothy as when say making pizza dough? Mine wasn’t as frothy but I put it down to no sugar.
Could I have over beaten the mixture?i used a stand mix and followed the time given in your recipe.
The dough itself was quite soft and light so wonder where I messed up.
I did take out the bread mid way to cover it with foil and opened the door once more to check on something else. Could that be it?
Sorry for this long message but looking forward to baking it again with better results next time.
Thank you
Hi Meghna! Thank you so much for trying this recipe and for asking how to help improve it for next time. It sounds like the dough could have benefitted from longer rise times (steps 3 and 5). Let the dough in the bowl get a little puffier and taller in step 3 and the shaped rolls get a little puffier in step 5. Avoid over-baking them, too. Overbeating the dough could also be it– only knead it/beat it for 6-7 minutes in step 2 or until it bounces back when poked with your finger.
Hi Sally. I’ve been making you’re recipes for years and thank you for making baking so simple and accessible! And I love love this recipe, the topping is key!
I actually have gluten in the house because of COVID as I’ve had to make my own bread flour.
Would you recommend adding gluten if I have it? It should make the rolls… denser?
Thank you!
Hi Ashleigh, We haven’t tested these rolls with any adding gluten but it shouldn’t be necessary here.
Great rolls – super easy and the whole family loved them.
I tried this recipe with flex egg. 1 egg = 1 tbsp ground flex seed + 3 tbsp hot water. Keep the mixer soaked for a bit.
Sally the buns came out great. Thank you for sharing your recipe.
I have made this twice. I am new to this so is it usual to add 8-9 TBSP of extra wheat flour at the end 1 tbsp at a time to get it to pull away from the sides of the bowl?
I also wanted to add that it did not seem to rise as much as I expected. I am in the process if baking these again this morning. I am in the 2 hour rise stage in my oven.
Totally normal, Tamara! Bread dough varies from day to day depending on how exact you measured each ingredient and can even change due to the humidity level in your kitchen – that’s why I try to give visual clues in addition to strict measurements 🙂
The best buns!
I shaped these a bit larger for burger buns and they came out beautifully in texture and flavor! I had to use almond milk and skipped the honey on top to make them a bit more savory but they were perfect. Thank you so much, I’ll definitely be making these again soon!
Once again as a newbie in the bread world – I so appreciate your recipes. This was very easy to follow although I did have some operator error issues. Despite me – they turned out well. I didn’t read correctly and put the honey butter on prior to cooking. Looking forward to trying them again!
Hi Sally, can I mix this dough with a paddle attachment on the mixer? I don’t have a dough hook. Thanks.
Yes, absolutely.
I had NEVER ventured out into the bread-making world, always terrified of the yeast. But, I have to say…as my first attempt at making bread…these turned out amazing!!! I have always been a fan of your recipes, and they always give me amazing results, so I knew I could trust your recipe to give me the best chance of succeeding with my first breadmaking attempt! Now…I want to try my hand at all the breads! Thanks for always having reliable, yummy, easy to follow, and just great recipes!
I made this for our Easter dinner tonight and they were perfect! I’ve never been able to find a good whole wheat roll recipe that didn’t turn out like hockey pucks, but these were so fluffy! And that honey butter and salt topping? I will never look at another roll the same way again. These are amazing! Thank you!
Used this dough to make sandwich bread (same single loaf approach as your white sandwich bread) and it was great!
Hi Sally, I am a newbie and have been following your blog. I have tried a lot of your recipes and love all of them.
Have a question, can I use this recipe to make hotdog buns? Or do you have any of hotdog/burger bun recipes? Thanks much.
Thank you so much for trusting my recipes! You can certainly try using this dough for different shapes like hot dog and hamburger buns. I haven’t.
Hello! Love your blog. I have been baking as a hobby my whole life and cane across your blog recently. I love it! Made many of your muffins in the past few months and made the whole wheat pizza dough last night. Was delicious! Thanks for including weights. I find it was easier to weigh my ingredients and it makes such a difference.
Can I use whole wheat bread flour in this recipe?
Hi Sally!
I will be trying these out tomorrow and i would like to ask if these can be made into burger buns, if so, how will the shaping process go?
Would i use the same method from the white rolls by tucking pieces under it to make a round top and then space them widely apart?
Im unsure going forward and making them until i can fully understand how the shaping process will be.
P.S i have tried the white dinner rolls and the fam loved it!
Thank you so much for every recipe that you put on here, they are fool-proof I tell ya!
Hi Ariffa, To make larger, round rolls from this dough you can shape them in a similar method to my dinner rolls, simply using more dough for each one. Let me know how they turn out!
These buns are amazing!! They turn out gorgeously soft with a perfect balance of sweet and salty. Dangerously addicting too…I tried to eat only one last night, and before I knew it I was nibbling on a second. Thankfully I have this awesome recipe in my arsenal now so I can just make more when I run out 🙂
This was very yummy. They cooked perfectly. Thank you. 🙂
This recipe turned out perfectly. I did all the mixing and kneading by hand, since I don’t have a stand mixer in my college apartment, but it never posed a problem or anything. They came out delicious with a nice color on the top and bottom and a beautifully soft middle. Would totally make them again!
Wow wow wow! Making the second double batch to take to a big thanksgiving celebration and am IMPRESSED! I will be adding this to my favorite folder for thanksgiving. I added lots of fresh rosemary and sage to pick up the flavors of the season, but that’s it! They are soft but appropriately chewy that a WW rolls should be. I love everything about these! Thank you Sally!
These are amazing! So flavorful, moist, slightly sweet and chewy. I made those yesterday for a BBQ and they were gone in minutes! The dough was a bit too moist for me, I needed to add more flour and I pur some seeds in. Really easy and tasty!
I have made these 2 times and everyone who has tasted them loved them, the only change I made was I added 3 tbs of molasses to the honey, great flavor and so soft.
I was able to make these into whole wheat rolls not just squares. I found the dough very user friendly.
Are we allowed to alter the recipes? I would have liked to have used half ap flour and half whole wheat.
I’m glad you enjoyed them! You can certainly try using half of each flour – let me know how they turn out!
I made these for the April Challenge. They are so yummy. Definitely sprinkle with sea salt at the end, it makes all the difference
These were AMAZING! I did exactly what you suggested, including buying the right type of yeast. It takes a while, but not much effort. I’m definitely going to make this instead of buying rolls in the future.
I just made these for the April challenge and they are so good. I usually expect whole wheat baked goods to be more on the dense side, but these were so soft and fluffy!!! Great recipe!
Wow. These rolls. SO GOOD!!! They were soft, fluffy, and so flavorful. We loved them!! That honey butter sea salt topping is PERFECT 😀
I’ve just started baking homemade breads and wondering if this could be made as a loaf? I made the basic bread recipe (bread bowls) today as 3 loaves and had success! Thank you for all the detailed information on the website.
Hi Deb! I personally haven’t tried turning this whole wheat dough into a loaf, but you certainly can try. I can’t see why it wouldn’t work properly. Let me know how it turns out.
I’m a newbie baker and I made these today as a personal challenge to try a yeast recipe before Thanksgiving. They came out very well, and I wanted to say thank you for your clear instructions and explanations! I’m so happy to be able to branch into yeast baking now.
These were fantastic! My kids loved them (score!). I had one to dip in my soup and then another for dessert- I spread homemade pumpkin butter on it. Delicious!
Thanks for this recipe! I made them just as your recipe noted. Mine didn’t quite rise in the oven as much as yours show in the pictures, and I had to let mine rise a little more the second time, as they just weren’t getting the height that I wanted/needed.The topping made them super good – I’ll definitely use the honey/butter/salt mix on other rolls too.
I made this recipe this week and they are AMAZING. I can’t get enough. Normally I make bread in my bread maker but this has changed me. Can’t wait to try other bread recipes of yours (I have only tried your delicious desserts in he past).