In Praise of Parker House Rolls

Parker House Rolls, Evans Caglage, photographer

While researching a story for The Dallas Morning News about those buttery Parker House rolls, I learned this about where they came from: 

The Parker House in Boston, creator of the rolls in the 1870s, is the longest continuously operating hotel in the United States. North Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh was a pastry chef there, and Malcolm X was a busboy. Literati from Charles Dickens to Mark Twain hung out at this grand hotel, which became the Omni Parker House in 1984. When in Boston, it was the place to be, as Edith Wharton imagined in her book The Age of Innocence, having the character Countess Ellen Olenska stay there. No doubt she removed her lace gloves before breaking off a piece of her roll (break, never cut). It would have been served from the left and placed on the bread plate, carried there by a silver fork and spoon. 

Susan Wilson, the hotel's official historian, wrote a book called Heaven, by Hotel Standards, capturing the hotel's tales and escapades. The title comes from an exchange between humorist Twain and a Globe reporter at the hotel in 1877. The reporter asked Twain how he was doing, and Twain responded, "You see for yourself that I'm pretty near heaven - not theologically of course, but by the hotel standard." 

JFK proposed to Jackie at Table 40 in the hotel restaurant. John Wilkes Boothe stayed there and had pistol practice nearby, within two weeks of shooting President Lincoln.  

As to the rolls themselves, their distinctive "pocketbook" shape has a myth attached that no one can verify, Wilson says. The shape came from a disgruntled chef who clenched the dough in his hand and threw it into the pan. There's no evidence this story is true and many others go with it. They remain in circulation today.

Read the story about Parker House rolls. A sidebar talks about how to break down an old Parker House roll recipe and interpret what's needed. 

To jump straight to a modern roll recipe, go here. After all, they make terrific sliders.