Name: Gluten-free Troll House Cookies
Ingredients: 1 cup butter; 1/2 cup brown sugar; 1 cup granulated sugar; Two eggs; 1 teaspoon gluten free vanilla; 1-1/2 cup brown rice flour; 1/2 cup potato flour (not potato starch flour); 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1 teaspoon salt; One package milk or semisweet chocolate chips

Why it works: Vanilla and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

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.

Vanilla + milktop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,187 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
Rice + potatotop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together851 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,374 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together35,032 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Butter: Creams with the sugars to give the cookies richness and a tender texture.
Granulated sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the cookies spread and brown during baking.
Brown sugar: Adds moisture and molasses flavor, and promotes browning and chewiness.
Eggs: Bind the dough and add structure and moisture to the cookies.
Brown rice flour: Provides the main structure in this gluten-free dough in place of wheat flour.
Baking soda: Reacts with the dough to help the cookies rise and spread and brown.

The step that matters

Removing the cookies from the oven. These cookies over-brown very quickly, so they should come out when only lightly browned. They keep firming as they cool, so residual heat finishes the centers and overbaking makes them dry and hard.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, rice, flour, milk):

Arrowrootfits better
Sweet potatofits better
Asparagusfits about as well
Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, rice, flour, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Rice	1 cup cooked (158g) white	206
Potato	1 medium (173g) baked	161
Chocolate	1 oz (28g) semisweet	155
Milk	1 cup (244ml) whole	149
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Vanilla	1 tsp extract (4ml)	12
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0

Gluten-free Troll House Cookies