No-Knead Slow Cooker Dinner Rolls – 🙌🏻😋 Learn how to make dinner rolls from scratch in your Crock-Pot in less than 2 hours WITHOUT kneading! These are the EASIEST rolls you’ll ever make! They have a soft and chewy center, a thin crust, and just 4 key ingredients! Whether it’s too hot to turn on your oven or your oven is maxed out for big holiday meals but you want homemade rolls, THIS is the dinner roll recipe to make!
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Easy Slow Cooker Dinner Rolls Recipe
I recently posted a Slow Cooker Bread recipe and it’s been a hit with readers so I decided to make dinner rolls in a Crock-Pot now!
I love this dinner roll recipe because you do not have to knead the dough! And there is no need for prolonged rise times.
Just stir the dough together with a wooden spoon, form 12 balls, plop them in your Crockpot, wait 10 minutes for them to rise before you turn it on for 90 minutes and let it do all the work.
The rolls are soft with a chewy center and a thin crust. The flavor is neutral – in a good way! They taste just how you want dinner rolls to taste.
Why Make Dinner Rolls in a Slow Cooker
- Homemade dinner rolls for a holiday meal like Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, or special family dinner are on your side dish menu, but your oven is already maxed out.
- It’s hot out and you don’t want to turn on your oven.
- You live in a situation where you don’t have an oven (dorm room, assisted living) or you’re going through a kitchen remodel and temporarily don’t have a working oven.
- You’s so curious that you’ve just got to try this! Especially because the recipe requires no kneading and no second rise – and the first and only rise time is 10 minutes!
Ingredients in No-Knead Crockpot Dinner Rolls
Only four key ingredients because I hardly count water or salt as true “ingredients” in this dinner roll recipe!
- Water
- Granulated sugar
- Unsalted melted butter
- Instant dry yeast
- All-purpose flour
- Salt
Note: Scroll down to the recipe card section of the post for the ingredients with amounts included and for more complete directions.
How to Make Dinner Rolls in a Slow Cooker
This is an overview of this easy Crock-Pot yeasted dinner roll recipe. More details are provided in the recipe card below and FAQs are addressed below as well. Make sure to read through them all if it’s your first time making bread!
- Line a large Crock-Pot with parchment paper. To a large 2-cup measuring cup or similar, add lukewarm water, sprinkle the yeast, sugar, stir to combine, and allow it to rest for 10 minutes during which time it should become foamy and creamy looking. Tip – This is called ‘proofing’ the yeast (proving it is alive and works) and while this isn’t technically necessary with instant dry yeast, for this recipe, it’s what you do. If your yeast doesn’t foam up, stop now (it was dead), and try again – because otherwise your bread will never rise later!
- In a large bowl, stir together the proofed yeast mixture with melted butter, flour, salt, and mix with a wooden spoon until dough forms.
- Divide the dough into 12 balls, add them to your slow cooker, cover it with a damp towel for 10 minutes to rest the dough.
- Remove the towel, place the lid on, and cook on HIGH for 90 minutes, or until the rolls are done.
- Optional – Place the cooked rolls on a baking sheet, brush the tops with a bit of melted butter, and place the tray under your broiler for 1-2 minutes to create a golden crust.
Storage
At Room Temp: The rolls will keep airtight at room temp for up to 3-4 days. It’s better that you don’t refrigerate. Just keep them on your counter or in your pantry.
In the Freezer: This recipe will keep airtight in the freezer for up to 1 to 2 months.
Recipe FAQs
Correct, there’s no kneading required. Stir the dough together in a mixing bowl and then divide it into 12 balls! Easiest dinner rolls ever! For that reason, even though I do have a stand mixer with a dough hook, it’s truly more work than it’s worth to haul it out and then clean it all up for this dough. Just stir the dough together by hand with a wooden spoon and you’re set.
By nature, bread dough is very sticky and tacky. The less flour added, the lighter and fluffier the finished product. However, there’s a limit. If it’s so tacky and sticky that it’s not taking shape and won’t form into dough, then add more flour to the bowl, a couple tbsp at a time, until it comes together.
This exact recipe was developed to be slow cooked rather than baked and so I haven’t used this exact dough recipe and baked it just to see what would happen. There’s the issue of not kneading it other than the one and only time, and the oven temp that throw me. Instead, try my No-Knead Dinner Rolls, The Best Soft and Fluffy Honey Dinner Rolls, or my Parker House Rolls recipes, all of which were developed to be made as baked dinner rolls.
I don’t know because I haven’t tried. I don’t have a bread machine either and am not familiar with how they work. Use your slow cooker for this one!
I recommend an oval shaped 6-quart slow cooker, although both 5-quart and 7-quart will work. Don’t use the smaller round ones since they’re not quite big enough to allow for enough space to let the rolls cook properly.
I use instant dry yeast. I use one standard sized packet, which is 1/4 ounce (or 2 1/4 teaspoons). I have always been partial to Red Star Platinum Yeast. It gives amazing results and is very forgiving in my experience with water temperature, rise times, kneading, and so forth. One packet of it is my gold standard. However there are a ton of brands on the market that are very reputable and old school standby
Instant dry yeast and active dry yeast are very different. You want INSTANT (not active) for this recipe. In general, instant is more potent, quicker acting, it has more active living yeast cells, and technically you don’t have to “proof it” – meaning, to dissolve it in a warm liquid at a specific temperature before using it. While most bakers will always dissolve either type of yeast in a liquid, with instant yeast it’s technically not necessary.
For this recipe you do absolutely need to use instant dry yeast because there is no dedicated rising time, you’re not kneading the dough, and you’re relying on the activation of the yeast to do ALL the work. For those reasons, you need a strong, fast-acting yeast. I do not recommend trying to see what happens if you use active rather than instant yeast. I don’t think the recipe will work.
I haven’t tried this recipe with gluten-free flour so I cannot comment or make recommendations. I’ve never baked yeast bread or rolls with gluten-free flour, so it’s out of my wheelhouse entirely. I’d use your favorite blend and hope for the best!
Yes you can certainly take these more in the savory direction by adding garlic powder, thyme, oregano, parsley, brush them with garlic butter after cooking or sprinkle some Parmesan cheese on them – so many ideas.
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No-Knead Slow Cooker Dinner Rolls
Equipment
- 1 6-quart slow cooker OR
Ingredients
- 1 cup lukewarm water
- 1 packet instant dry yeast, (about 2 ¼ teaspoons, do NOT use active dry yeast, read blog post FAQs for more info)
- 1 tablespoon white granulated sugar
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
- 1 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- To an oval 6-quart slow cooker or similar (5-quart or 7-quart are fine, but don't go smaller/round, and bigger is unnecessary), place a piece of parchment paper and I like to spray my parchment with cooking spray, although it's optional. Set aside momentarily.
- To a 2-cup glass measuring cup or similar, add the water (warm water from the tap is fine, no need to warm it more) and sprinkle the yeast on top and add the sugar. Allow it to rest for about 10 minutes, during which time it should turn foamy and creamy. This is called 'proofing' the yeast, or proving that it's alive. While not technically necessary when using instant dry yeast, I always do it to make sure my yeast is good. Tips – The water should be warm, but not too hot because you don't want to kill the yeast which can happen if it's too hot. Water that feels nicely hot to wash your hands in is what you're looking for. If the yeast does not turn foamy and creamy, it means it's dead or not active, and you would need to start over. Don't use it because your bread will never rise!
- While waiting for the yeast to proof, to a large mixing bowl, add the flour, melted butter, and salt.
- Add the yeasty water mixture to the flour mixture, and using a wooden spoon, stir to combine and form a dough. Dough Tips – Bread dough by its very nature is sticky and tacky and in general, the less flour you add, the lighter and more airy the finished bread or rolls will be. However, if your dough is so wet and sloppy that it's just not coming together and it's sticking very badly to the spoon and the bowl, sprinkle a couple tablespoons of flour, stir more, and repeat as necessary until it's firm enough to take shape so you'll be able to handle it.
- Form 12 equally sized balls of dough. Tips – Flour your hands a bit to make this easier and less sticky. Don't make more or less balls, do as indicated.
- Place the dough balls into the slow cooker and cover the top with a damp towel to rest for 10 minutes. This is the first and only rise.
- Remove the towel and cover the slow cooker with the lid and cook on HIGH for about 1 ½ hours, or until the center of the rolls are cooked through. Cooking Tips – If your rolls appear to be cooking too quickly on one side (some slow cookers heat faster on one side and cook unevenly), simply rotate the slow cooker insert halfway through the cooking time. Cooking time can vary dramatically based on the heat output of your machine. Some are much more potent than others, and things will cook faster in a 7-quart and slower in a 5-quart, in general, based on fullness and surface area. Because slow cookers vary a ton in their heat output, the cook time of 1 1/2 hours is an estimate only, and you should slow cook your rolls as long as necessary, even if that mean 2 or 2 1/2+ hours. Also, if your kitchen is warm or cold, the type of flour you used, the density of your dough, will all affect cooking duration.The rolls are done when the crust has set, and the interior is cooked through. In general, I would err on the side of more cooking, and not less. You don't want to bite into one and find that it's raw. You cannot put it back! Baking does not work that way so I like to be extra certain it's done. You can try to insert a long wooden skewer in it, and if it comes out gooey at all, it's not done. RESIST the urge to keep checking on your rolls because every time you lift the lid of your slow cooker, heat escapes, and it unnecessarily slows down the cooking process. Check after an hour or so, but be mindful.
- Allow the rolls to cool before serving. You can serve them with butter, honey, jam, jelly, etc.
- Optionally, if you’d like a more browned crust, you can place the rolls on a parchment lined baking sheet, preheat your oven to broil, brush the crust with a bit of melted butter, and place it under the broiler for 1-2 minutes. BE VERY CAREFUL if you are doing this! Bread is delicate and can go from fine to burnt to a crisp in less than 30 seconds under a 500F+ degrees broiler so make sure to stand in front of your oven and watch it the entire time, like a hawk, so you don't burn it.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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