Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Raised Doughnuts
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Mix the raised bread dough, melted butter, sugar, eggs, and spices until well combined.
Roll out the dough on a floured surface.
Cut out doughnut shapes.
Fry
Fry the doughnuts immediately until golden brown.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Raised bread dough
- Provides the yeasted, airy structure that gives the doughnuts their light crumb.
- Eggs
- Add richness and structure, helping the dough hold its shape and tenderness.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the doughnuts brown evenly in the hot fat.
- Melted butter
- Adds fat for a softer texture and richer flavor in the dough.
The step that matters
Fry the doughnuts immediately. Cut doughnuts left to rest can over-proof and absorb more oil. Frying them right away keeps them light and helps them brown well.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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