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Dessert

Cream Puffs

A baked pastry filled with a sweet cream made from eggs, flour, sugar, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Cream Puffs

Ingredients

Directions

Make the choux paste

  1. Boil one cup hot water with one-half cup butter.

  2. Add one cup flour, beating to a smooth paste.

  3. When the mixture is cold, add three eggs, beating hard each time.

  4. Drop spoonfuls into pan, spaced apart, bake in quick oven.

Make the cream filling

  1. Mix two eggs, two teaspoons flour, cold water, one pint milk, and three tablespoons sugar.

  2. When milk and sugar boil, add eggs and flour to thicken.

  3. Flavor to taste.

Make the dough and bake and serve

  1. Put in a sauce pan two cupfuls of water (warm) and one half pound butter, stir until it comes to a slow boil.

  2. Add gradually, stirring all the time, three-quarters of a pound sifted flour, and cook one minute.

  3. Beat perfectly smooth and turn into a deep dish to cool.

  4. Have ready six eggs whites and yolks.

  5. Beat the eggs separately and whip into the cooled dough, adding the whites last.

  6. Drop one large spoonful on buttered paper and bake in a quick oven for ten minutes until a golden brown.

  7. When cold, split on side and fill with cream filling.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

684Calories
19 gProtein
18 gFat
108 gCarbs

Counts 4 of 5 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

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. See the original page.

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. Flour + sugartop 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

Eggs
Add structure and rise by puffing with steam and setting the paste as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, tenderising the paste and helping it brown.
Flour
Forms the starch paste that gives the shells their structure and set.
Milk (in the method)
Provides the liquid base of the custard, giving it body and a creamy texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cream filling brown lightly.

The step that matters

Beat the eggs in gradually and whip the whites last. Eggs must be fully incorporated so the paste becomes smooth and glossy; if the paste is too hot or too wet, it will be slack and the puffs will not rise and hold their shape.

“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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