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Dessert

Cream Biscuits and Doughnuts

A baked biscuit and doughnut made with flour, cream of tartar, sour cream, baking soda, sweet milk, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk 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 ↓

Cream Biscuits and Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour and cream of tartar.

  2. In another bowl, combine the sour cream and baking soda.

  3. Add the sweet milk to the sour cream mixture.

  4. Combine all ingredients and mix until smooth.

Bake

  1. Spoon the batter into greased tin cups.

  2. Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden 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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

Flour and milk 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

Sifted flour
Provides the main structure as the batter sets in the oven.
Cream of tartar
Reacts with baking soda to release gas, helping the biscuits rise.
Sour cream
Adds acidity and moisture, tenderizing the crumb and activating the baking soda.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour cream to produce gas that lifts the batter.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and loosens the batter to a smooth consistency.

The step that matters

Mix the batter until smooth. Mixing only until the ingredients combine keeps the crumb tender. Overmixing develops gluten, which makes biscuits tough, and the leavening gas released by the baking soda and cream of tartar escapes if the batter sits too long before baking.

“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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