Start by peeling the sweet potato and chopping it into roughly 1” chunks. Place in a saucepan over high heat with just enough water to cover the sweet potato. Bring to a boil and cook until the sweet potato is fork-tender, about 10-15 minutes.

Drain the water, reserving ¼ cup of it for the dough. Place the sweet potato pieces in a large bowl and mash with a fork or potato masher until smooth. Set aside to cool.

In the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, or in a large mixing bowl with a hand mixer, add 1 cup of the mashed sweet potato, ¼ cup reserved water from boiling the potato, the yeast mixture, 2 large eggs, the rest of the honey (3 tablespoons), the sliced ¼ cup of butter, and 1-2 cups of bread flour. Mix on low speed until everything is thoroughly combined, about 2-3 minutes.

Switch the paddle attachment to the dough hook and start adding the rest of the flour, a bit at a time, until the dough starts coming together. Add the salt and scrape down the sides of the bowl so that all the flour is incorporated.

Once the dough has come together and all 5 cups of flour have been added, let the dough knead on low speed for another 5 minutes or so. The dough should be coming cleanly off the sides of the bowl and be tacky but not sticky. If the dough feels too wet and sticky, add more flour a tablespoon at a time, until the dough is only slightly tacky. If you can press a finger into the dough and it slowly springs back, the dough is ready.

If you don’t have a stand mixer, you can also do the kneading by hand after mixing in all the flour. Once all the flour has been mixed in, place the dough on a floured surface and knead by hand for 5-10 minutes.

Once kneaded, add the dough to a lightly oiled mixing bowl and turn to coat every side. Cover with plastic wrap or a damp towel and place in a warm area to rise until doubled in size, 1-2 hours.

After the dough has doubled in size, punch it down to release the air and place it on a lightly floured surface. Stretch and shape the dough into a large rectangle and divide it into 4 equal strips. I use a bench scraper for this as it easily cuts through dough.

Taking each strip of the dough, divide again into 5 equal pieces. Shape each piece of dough into a ball with a smooth top and tuck the edges underneath, rolling the bottom gently to seal it. Place each ball of dough into a 9x13 baking dish. Repeat this process until you have 20 balls of dough nestled in the baking dish.

Cover the dough balls again and let rise a second time for 30-45 minutes. About halfway through the second rise, preheat your oven to 350°F / 180°C.

Once risen and poofy again, place the dough in the middle of the oven and bake until the tops are golden brown, about 18-24 minutes. As soon as you remove from the oven, brush the tops with melted butter and allow to cool 15-20 minutes before serving or removing from the baking dish to cool and store.

Serve with honey butter, or even better, make brown sugar cinnamon butter for them.

This part is optional, but the brown sugar cinnamon butter is a perfect addition to these sweet potato dinner rolls.

Leave ½ cup butter out when you start making the sweet potato dinner rolls so that it will be very soft when the rolls are done.

In a mixing bowl, add the softened butter, ¼ cup brown sugar, and ¼ teaspoon of ground cinnamon. Use a fork to mash and mix the ingredients together until the sugar is fully incorporated.

Alternatively, add the ingredients to a mixing bowl and use a hand mixer to combine everything. Once combined, increase the speed and mix for another minute or two for a really soft, whipped butter.

Store in the refrigerator when not being used.