Golden Rolls

Three years after this recipe post my husband still asks for these. And my 7-year-old Craigslist bread machine that leaped off the counter 6 months ago is still great at making bread dough. (I was shopping and it was making me pizza dough. I think it somehow rocked itself off the counter. Either that or it came alive while I wasn't looking like something out of The Brave Little Toaster.)

*Updated 8-8-17*

I have simplified the recipe a little -- previously I used wheat flour, bread flour, and oat flour. Now I just have white and wheat flours because it's easier. Do you have favorite recipes you have adapted?

Ingredients

2 cups sliced carrots
1 cup wheat flour
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon active dry yeast (or a 2 ounce package of dry yeast)
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup oil
1 egg
2 cups white flour
Non-stick spray

Directions

1. Fill a medium large saucepan with water and bring to a boil over high heat. Add carrots, decrease to medium heat, and cook until tender, stirring occasionally, 7-10 minutes.

2. While that's cooking, add the wheat flour, brown sugar, yeast, and salt to your bread maker.

3. Drain the cooked carrots in a strainer and run them under cold water for 30 seconds to slightly cool them.

4. Put carrots, 1/2 cup water, oil, and egg in a blender or food processor and puree. Check if it's the right temperature for yeast bread. It should be very warm but not hot, like a baby's bottle--about 100 F-120 F.
If needed, adjust (though I've never needed to).

5. Add the carrot puree to the bread maker and stir everything with a wooden spoon.
(My bread maker works better if you help stir at this point.)

6. Add the white flour and turn the machine to the dough setting. Let run. (Time will vary by machine. Mine goes for 1 hour 20 minutes.)

7. Form dough into desired roll shapes on cookie sheets. Sometimes this dough turns out really sticky. Grease your hands and even use a greased cookie scoop to help shape them without adding too much extra flour.

8. When the dough is shaped, mist lightly with non-stick spray and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

9. Bake rolls at 350 F for 12-15 minutes until browned.