Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Crullers II
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
In a bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the melted lard and sugar.
Add the milk and flavoring, then stir in the baking powder.
Gradually add flour until the dough is easy to roll.
Shape and fry
Roll out the dough and cut into desired shapes.
Fry in hot oil 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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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and add richness and structure.
- Melted lard
- Adds fat for tenderness and a rich flavour.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the fried surface brown.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas that lifts the dough so it becomes light when fried.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that lets the dough be rolled and shaped.
The step that matters
Fry in hot oil until golden brown. If the oil is not hot enough, the dough absorbs more oil and turns greasy and heavy. If it is too hot, the outside browns before the inside cooks. Steady heat gives a crisp, cooked result.
“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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