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Dessert

Blanche Kammerer

A buttery, sweet roll made with milk, yeast, sugar, flour, butter, eggs, and mace, shaped into crescents and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Paidar, Marie, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Blanche Kammerer

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Make a sponge by mixing one-half cup lukewarm milk, two cakes yeast, a little sugar and flour.

  2. Sift one quart flour, one-half cup sugar, one teaspoon salt, and one-quarter teaspoon mace into a bowl.

  3. Work in one-half pound butter with finger tips, add four yolks well beaten, one and one-half cups lukewarm milk, the raised sponge, and beat well.

  4. Add more flour if necessary to make a stiff dough.

  5. Cover and let rise until light.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape a teaspoon of dough into round balls and place on a floured board.

  2. Let rise a few minutes.

  3. Roll each ball into a triangular piece, roll over and over from the longest side to the opposite corner, and shape into crescents.

  4. Place crescents on greased tins.

  5. Brush with beaten egg and sprinkle with poppy seed.

  6. Let rise and bake in a moderate oven for about twenty to twenty-five minutes.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

755Calories
21 gProtein
21 gFat
120 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 7 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot in our table0
Cakenot 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.

By Paidar, Marie, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp. 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. 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. Milk + flourtop 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. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the gluten structure that holds the stiff dough and lets the rolls keep their crescent shape.
Yeast
Ferments the sponge, producing gas that makes the dough rise and turn light.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and gives the rolls richness.
Egg yolks
Add richness, colour and tenderness to the dough, and enrich the crust when brushed on.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and yeast so the dough can develop and rise.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast early on and adds mild sweetness and browning.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until light. Yeast needs time to produce gas that lightens the dough. Rising too short leaves dense rolls, while over-proofing weakens the gluten so the shaped crescents may collapse or flatten in the oven.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Jalapenofits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, sugar, butter. 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.

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