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Dessert

Plain Buns

Plain buns are simple yeast breads shaped into round or square buns, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Plain Buns

Why it works: Flour and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,341 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Plain Buns

Oven, in the book's wordsA good brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a good brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Mix flour, water, yeast, and sugar until smooth. Do not make the dough too stiff.

  2. Shape the dough into round or square buns.

  3. Allow the buns to rise until doubled in size.

Bake and finish

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Bake the buns in the preheated oven until golden brown.

  3. Optionally, brush the hot buns with butter and dust with sugar and cinnamon, or ice them like flat cross buns.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Flour
Provides the gluten network that gives the buns their structure.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become airy.
Water
Hydrates the flour so gluten can form and the dough becomes workable.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and contributes to browning in the oven.
Butter
Adds richness and a soft texture when brushed on the hot buns.

The step that matters

Keep the dough soft, not stiff. A stiff dough has less water to hydrate the flour, so gluten develops less and the buns can turn out dense. A slightly soft dough lets the yeast gas spread and the crumb stay tender.

“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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