Grain-free Herbed Cheese Rolls (gluten-free)

Grain-free Herbed Cheese Rolls
gluten-free | grain-free | tree nut free | yeast free
by Alexa Lehr | The Pioneer Chicks | April 20, 2023
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These grain-free herbed cheese rolls are perfectly delicious when warmed, buttered, and sprinkled with savory garlic salt! Okay, maybe they would be good with homemade honey butter too, but I personally am a garlic salt fan. However you like to enjoy these cheesy herbed rolls, they are sure to be a hit on your homestead. They are one of the easiest grain-free roll recipes I have ever made and they only require a few simple ingredients. Based off of traditional Brazilian cheese bread, these savory rolls are the perfect side to any homestead meal!

Modern Pioneer Recipe

I call these grain-free herbed cheese rolls a modern pioneer recipes since I don’t think the early pioneers would have made cheese rolls. But…. all the ingredients in these rolls are certainly ingredients the early pioneers would have had on hand, or at least would have had suitable substitutes for. Who knows, maybe some early pioneer families did make their own version of a cheese roll like bread!

This roll recipe only uses one flour: tapioca flour. Tapioca flour is a starchy flour that is derived from cassava root. That means the texture of these rolls is going to be different than traditional rolls made with processed flours. When enjoyed fresh and warm, these rolls can have a light and stretchy texture. When the rolls cool, they tend to get a little denser. But I have found that toasting and buttering leftover rolls makes them just as delicious as when they were fresh!

Butter, eggs, and cheese are three other key homestead ingredients in this roll recipe. If you make your own butter and/or cheese, go ahead and use those in this roll recipe for an authentic from-scratch dinner roll! I like to use butter from pasture-raised, grass-fed cows and I use fresh eggs from my own homestead flock. For the cheese, I like to use raw (unpasteurized) cow’s or goat’s cheese.

These cheese rolls can also be made allergy-friendly! They are…

• grain-free
• gluten-free
• corn free
• coconut free
• soy free
• sugar free
• dairy-free option
• yeast free

For more homemade bread-product recipes, make sure you check out these grain-free bread rolls or the grain-free bread recipe that I like to use for making grain-free French toast!

Baking Yeast-Free on the Homestead

Spoiler Alert! If you are looking for a grain-free roll recipe that has the same texture and taste as a wheat and yeast dinner roll, than this is not the right recipe. These cheese rolls do not contain yeast and will not have that yeasty flavor that most traditional dinner rolls have. They are also made only with tapioca flour, which gives the rolls a different texture than wheat or all-purpose flour.

On that note though, these rolls do have a great taste and the texture is not gooey (make sure they bake for long enough) and not spongy. I love the pleasing cheesy taste with slight hints of the herbs used in the rolls. The texture of fresh cheese rolls is soft and light…. perfectly delicious when buttered and garnished with garlic salt!

While I do love using yeast in my baked goods (like these grain-free bagels or these grain-free cinnamon rolls), I try to limit how many yeasty products I consume on a regular basis. Yeast in moderation is okay, but too much yeast can cause or increase yeast-based ailments. It is also not a low-inflammation food. Which is why I have come up with some delicious alternatives to yeast-based recipes.

While they may not have the traditional yeasty-flavor, they have their own flavor that is just as delicious. My go-to ingredients for replacing yeast in most recipes are…

• baking soda
• baking powder (buy a corn-free brand!)
• apple cider vinegar (used to activate baking soda)

These three ingredients can often provide a similar loft to a baked good that would normally rely on yeast for rising. A few of my favorite yeast free recipes include this grain-free pizza crust and these grain-free carrot cake sweet rolls!

Making Dairy-free Cheese Rolls

Despite the fact that these rolls contain both cheese and butter, they can actually be made dairy-free. I have a dairy sensitivity, but I am just fine with organic, grass-fed butter and can usually eat raw cheese as well. However, I do enjoy using dairy-free cheese substitutes in recipes when I don’t have raw cheese on hand.

Butter: For the butter in these rolls, you can use coconut oil or your favorite dairy-free butter substitute. Be careful when melting the coconut oil though. Completely melted coconut oil will add more moisture to the dough, so you may need to cut back on the amount of water you add.

Cheese: Instead of raw cheese, you can easily use any dairy-free cheese shreds. Daiya Foods makes dairy-free and tree nut free cheese using tapioca. Miyoko’s and Follow Your Heart are two other brands that have dairy-free cheese substitutes that I have tried and enjoyed.

You can also leave out the cheese entirely from the recipe (which I have done before, accidentally). They will not rise as well and the texture will be slightly different but they still turn out okay.

Our Cheese Roll History…

My whole family loves these rolls, and my mom and sister also like making them too! Each of us have our own way of making these rolls. My mom likes to do the recipe by memory, and she does a pretty good job at doing it by memory. My sister likes to somehow adapt the recipe so that it turns out flat, which we call space cheese bread. Space cheese bread is very flat and the batter is very runny. It still tastes good, but you may not be going for the ‘completely flat’ look for your dinner roll.

Note: Space cheese bread is made when the dough is too moist. To avoid this problem, add the water in small increments. The dough should be able to hold its shape when it is formed into a ball. If your dough does get too moist, add some more tapioca flour.

I like to serve these grain-free herbed cheese rolls with soups, salads, pasta dishes, or have them for breakfast with eggs. They also work great as sandwich rolls. You can use them as hamburger buns, use them as sandwich rounds for your favorite lunch meat, or turn them into a breakfast sandwich!

My favorite way to have these grain-free herbed cheese rolls is by toasting them, buttering them, and then adding a generous sprinkle of garlic salt on top! My sister likes to eat them any way… warm, cold, with butter, without butter. It’s up to you how you want to enjoy your cheese rolls!

Where to Find the Ingredients:

• Bob’s Red Mill tapioca flour
• Bragg’s apple cider vinegar
• Bob’s Red Mill baking soda
• Redmond sea salt
• Supplies: unbleached parchment paper

These delicious grain-free herbed cheese rolls are soft, savory, and the perfect dinner roll to make completely from scratch using simple ingredients that you probably already have stocked in the homestead pantry (or fridge). Try using fresh eggs from your homestead flock, homegrown herbs, and homemade butter or cheese to make these cheese rolls as much from-scratch as possible. I love having these cheese rolls with a slather of butter and a sprinkle of garlic salt for a savory side to soups, salads, pasta, or eggs!

And make sure you join our modern pioneer wagon train (aka our newsletter) so you don’t miss any other chuckwagon recipes! Have a recipe request? Feel free to jot us a note, we are always open to making new recipes in a modern pioneer fashion!