The Egg Wash Hack To Elevate Frozen Dinner Rolls

It would be nice if we all had time to cook everything from scratch for every meal, but when life gets in the way, there are plenty of perfectly good pre-made foods out there that you can pass off as your own while skipping the heavy prep. On those busy nights, give yourself permission to eat a few from-scratch foods mixed with some pre-made items, like serving a frozen lasagna with a fresh-made salad, or doctoring up a box of macaroni and cheese with shredded rotisserie chicken and frozen veggies. Bread freezes especially well, and partially-baked or unbaked store-bought frozen dinner rolls are an easy way to get fresh bread on the table in a snap. It's also easy to take your frozen dinner rolls to the next level if you want to be a little fancy — all you need is an egg and some (optional) spices.

Frozen rolls are great for weeknights because you can take out only as many as you need for one dinner while keeping the rest frozen until later, which cuts down on food waste. Next time you're reaching into the freezer for a couple of rolls, grab an egg out of the refrigerator at the same time and make an egg wash.

Store-bought dinner rolls tend to be pretty basic recipes made with just flour, salt, and yeast, so it's easy to make them a little more tasty with some fat and flavor in the form of an egg wash and added seasoning. A splash of egg wash on your frozen rolls is the perfect adherent for spices, and it'll make your rolls look super professional. It's also very easy to do: All you need is an egg, a little bit of water, and a pastry brush. Crack your egg into a bowl and whisk it around with a couple of tablespoons of water, then paint a thin coating on top of each dinner roll. You can stop there if you just want shiny, restaurant-quality rolls with a little extra browning on top, or you can add extra flavor by adding some toppings. If you're allergic to eggs, use an unexpected alternative that's probably already in your fridge — thinned-out yogurt.

Egg wash provides a sticky surface for any dried seasoning, seeds, or cheese, and it's a great way to punch up the flavor of plain dinner rolls. After you paint on a layer of egg wash, you can dip or sprinkle the rolls with your flavor of choice. Try adding poppy, sesame, or caraway seeds, Italian seasoning, everything bagel mix, or grated parmesan to your egg-washed rolls for some easy, classic flavors.

If you want to try some other flavor combinations, mix and match ingredients like dried cheese powder and chili powder. You can also go for sweet topping combos like cinnamon and sugar or brown sugar and pumpkin pie spice. Anything that tastes good on bread or toast will work.

Make sure before you add seasoning to the top of your rolls that it's balanced and flavorful by mixing your spices with either salt or sugar (depending on if your mix is savory or sweet). If you give it a taste and it's something you'd sprinkle on a piece of toast or popcorn, it's ready to go. As a bonus, if you don't use all your seasoning mix on your dinner rolls, save it for a batch of the aforementioned popcorn or sprinkle it on your toast slices in the morning.

Once you try the egg wash hack you'll probably want to break out the bread more often at dinner time. If you go overboard with making too many dinner rolls, you can always pop them back in the freezer and use them for another recipe like bread pudding, or you can grate your frozen rolls to make breadcrumbs. It's always better to have extra rolls at dinner rather than not enough!