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Bread

Vienna Bread

A yeast-raised white dough shaped into crescents, risen, brushed with egg white and baked until light brown.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Vienna Bread

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, combine warm water, butter, sugar, and salt.

  2. Let it cool.

  3. Add the beaten egg yolk and the dissolved yeast cake.

  4. Mix in flour until the dough is very stiff.

  5. Knead the dough in a bowl for about 10 minutes until smooth.

  6. Cover the dough with a cloth and let it rise in a warm place until it triples in size.

  7. Knead the dough again and let it rise, repeating this process until ready to shape.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll the dough out, cut into squares, then triangles.

  2. Roll each triangle from the right angle to form crescents.

  3. Let the crescents rise again.

  4. Brush with egg white before baking.

  5. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) until light brown.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the stiff dough its structure and chew.
Yeast cake
Ferments the dough, producing gas that makes it rise and become airy.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and gives a softer texture.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and contributes to browning of the crust.
Egg white
Brushed on before baking to give the crescents a glossy, browned surface.

The step that matters

Kneading until smooth. Kneading develops gluten so the dough can trap the gas from rising. Under-kneading leaves a weak dough that collapses or bakes up dense.

“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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