Easter Rolls Recipe

These show stopping Easter rolls are impossibly soft, light and fluffy, concealing a whole creme egg in every portion! Learn how to bake them.

The bread itself is an enriched dough, made with bread flour, milk, butter, sugar and yeast, and made extra fluffy with a 'tangzhong paste'.

Tangzhong (also known as a water roux or a tangzhong water roux) is a simple paste made by mixing flour and water (sometimes milk) into a thin slurry and cooking briefly in a pan to create a pudding-like paste, which is then incorporated into the dough. It's a super simple extra step that makes bread impossibly soft and fluffy.

This Easter rolls recipe was developed taking Kim Joy's Tangzhong Cat-Shaped Bread recipe as a starting point and then tweaking to incorporate the sweet filling.

To make the bread, you'll start by making the tangzhong paste, as decribed, and then make the dough by combing the paste with bread flour, milk, butter, sugar, yeast and a pinch of salt.

It's a sticky dough to work with at first, but it comes together really beautifully as you knead and turns into a lovely smooth, light ball of dough.

You'll then leave the dough to rise and double in size, then divide into nine equal pieces. You'll then pinch each piece of dough around a creme egg to create pretty buns that hide a chocolatey secret.

You'll let the rolls prove and grow in a lined tray, then brush with beaten egg, sprinkle with pearly sugar and bake!

When you tear these beautiful Easter rolls apart, the light dough yields into long, feather light strands in the most satisfying way, and the creme egg filling oozes out. Heavenly!

The full recipe with detailed ingredients and instructions is below. I've included a photograph of each step to help you along the way. If you have any questions, just drop me a comment. Enjoy!

Instructions

Make The Tangzhong Paste.

Put the flour and water in a small pan.

Whisk to a smooth paste. 

Place the pan over a low-medium heat and stir until thickened to a pudding-like consistency. 

Spoon into a small bowl and close cover with cling film, which means the wrap should touch the surface of the paste.

Place in the fridge until cool.

Make The Dough

Put the milk in a pan and warm gently until it just starts to steam but not boil then pour into a jug. 

Add the cubed butter and leave to cool until it feels warm but not hot (max 38C/104F if you have a thermometer). 

When the milk is cool enough, add the sugar, salt, egg and the tangzhong paste you made earlier.

Whisk together well.

In a large bowl, add the flour and yeast.

Stir together. 

Pour into the liquid from the jug.

Mix with a wooden spoon to give a shaggy dough.

Tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes. 

If the dough is difficult to work with at first, you can turn the bowl upside down over it and leave it to rest for 10 minutes before kneading. This will allow the flour to absorb more of the liquid, making it easier to work with. 

When the dough is smooth and springy, form it into a ball.

Clean and lightly oil your bowl, place the dough in it, cover and leave in a warm place to rise for 1-1.5 hours or until doubled in size.  As this is an enriched dough, it will probably take longer to rise than a simple yeast, flour and water dough.

Shape the rolls

When the dough has doubled in size, knock it back by pushing your fist into the bowl, then turnout onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly just to work out the larger air bubbles.

Weigh the dough so that you can equally divide it into 9 pieces. The weight may vary slightly, but my dough weighed 675 g (23.8 oz), meaning each piece weighed 75 g (2.65 oz) each. 

Shape each piece into a ball by flattening into a circle.

Next fold from the edges to the middle, then flip over and tuck the dough underneath a few times to create a tight surface. 

Cover the balls with a damp tea towel and allow to rest for 10 minutes.

You’ll now wrap the dough around the chocolate eggs. To do this, take a balls of dough, flatten it to a disc, place an egg in the centre and then bring the dough up and around it, pinch to seal.

Place each roll pinched side down on a lined tray, well spaced. 

Cover with lightly oiled plastic wrap and leave to prove in a warm place for about 45 minutes or until doubled in size.

You can test if the dough is fully risen by poking the tip of your finger into an inconspicuous spot. If it doesn’t spring back, the dough is ready.

Bake the rolls

Near the end of the proving time, preheat the oven to 200C (180C) fan.

Brush the beaten egg on top of the buns just before baking.

Scatter with peal sugar.

Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown. If it looks like it's browning too much on top, cover loosely with foil.

Transfer to a rack and leave to cool completely.

Once you've given my recipe a go, I'd love you to come back and leave a comment letting me know how yours turned out.

I'd love to see your videos and pics, too! Just tag me on social media. I'm @emilylearycooks on Twitter and TikTok or @amummytoo on Instagram.

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