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Bread

Short Process or Straight Dough

A quick yeast dough that rises in a warm place and can be shaped as desired.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Short Process or Straight Dough

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dough

  1. Soften the yeast in a small amount of lukewarm liquid.

  2. In a separate bowl, mix the remaining lukewarm liquid with salt, sugar, and shortening.

  3. Combine the softened yeast with the liquid mixture.

  4. Gradually add sifted flour until the dough is the right consistency.

  5. If the dough is too soft, add more flour; if too stiff, add a little water and knead again.

  6. Knead the dough for 5 to 10 minutes until smooth and elastic.

Rise and shape

  1. Cover the dough and let it rise in a warm place (80°F to 88°F) until doubled in size, about 1 to 2 hours.

  2. Once risen, knead the dough again to expel gas bubbles, then divide and mold as desired.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Yeast
Ferments the dough, producing gas that makes it rise and become airy.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough structure and elasticity.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning later in baking.
Liquid
Hydrates the flour so gluten can form and dissolves the other ingredients.
Shortening
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and softens the dough texture.

The step that matters

Judging the dough consistency. Flour absorbs liquid differently depending on humidity and flour type. Adding flour gradually and checking the feel keeps the dough soft yet workable, so gluten develops well and the rise stays even.

“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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