Skip to main content
Dessert

Plain Doughnuts

A simple doughnut made with flour, baking powder, sugar, milk, butter, egg, and fried in lard or suet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Plain Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Sift together the flour, baking powder, and sugar in a bowl.

  2. In another bowl, mix the milk, melted butter, and beaten egg.

  3. Combine the wet and dry ingredients to form a smooth dough.

Shape and fry

  1. Roll out the dough and cut it into desired shapes.

  2. Fry the doughnuts in boiling lard or suet 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the dough together after frying.
Baking powder
Releases gas as it reacts, making the doughnuts rise and turn light.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the golden brown colour develop during frying.
Milk
Adds moisture so the flour hydrates into a smooth, workable dough.
Melted butter
Adds fat, which tenderises the crumb and adds richness.
Egg
Binds the dough and adds structure and richness.

The step that matters

Frying in boiling lard or suet. If the fat is not hot enough, doughnuts absorb excess oil and turn greasy and heavy. If it is too hot, the outside browns before the centre cooks through. Steady heat gives an even, golden 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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes