Bunny Rolls

I turned to Bajaderka's recipe once again. Sometimes I'm looking for something specific and nothing seems quite right. Then I check Bajaderka's recipes, and usually I find just what I wanted. This time was no different. I was looking for a recipe for good rolls, and since Easter is fast approaching, I couldn't take my eyes off these. Unfortunately, mine didn't turn out as pretty as the author's. Besides the bunnies, I had a few gremlins and some creatures of no particular shape. Still, my girls recognized that they were bunnies. That's already a big success, right? I'll keep practicing, and maybe one day I'll manage to shape a perfect bunny. I suspect I didn't cut the dough deeply enough. The most important thing is that they taste very good, and the honey glaze is great.

bunny rolls

I'm quoting the author:

Ingredients:

(makes about 10-12 rolls)

• 1 cup milk
• 4 tbsp honey
• 2 ½ tsp dry yeast
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 2 large egg yolks
• 4 cups flour
• 1 ½ tsp salt

Glaze:

• 2 tbsp honey

• 4 tbsp butter

• 2/3 cup sugar

• 12 raisins, cut in half

Heat the milk with the honey in a saucepan until lukewarm, remove from the heat, add the yeast, and let it sit for 5 minutes. Add the egg yolks and butter, mix well, and pour into a large bowl. Gradually add the flour, add the salt, and knead until the dough is smooth and shiny, about 15-20 minutes. Cover and leave to rise in a warm place for about 1 ½ hours, until doubled in volume. You can also leave the covered dough to rise in the refrigerator overnight and shape the rolls the next morning.

Glaze:
Gently heat all the ingredients in a saucepan until the butter melts, remove from the heat, and keep warm, covered.

bunny rolls step by step

Turn the risen dough out onto a work surface, divide it into 12 equal pieces, and shape each one into an egg (like in the photo above). Place them on a baking sheet that is greased with butter or lined with parchment paper. Now use clean scissors to shape them into bunnies. Holding the scissors perpendicular to the baking sheet, make a small cut in the thicker end of the roll – that will be the tail.
To make the ears, make two 5 cm cuts with the scissors on both sides of the roll, starting from the thicker part and cutting toward the narrower one. Make indentations for the eyes with a stick, and press half a raisin into each one in the narrow part (fairly deep, so they don't fall out as the rolls rise).
Brush the rolls with half of the warm glaze and leave them to rise, loosely covered with plastic wrap, for about 45 minutes, until doubled in volume. After they rise, brush them with the rest of the warm glaze and bake at 200°C (390°F) for about 10 minutes, maybe even less, checking on them from time to time to make sure they don't burn. Bajaderka recommends putting an empty baking sheet on the bottom of the oven and sliding the sheet with the rolls onto the middle rack, so the bottoms won't burn.

Enjoy!