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My Special Rolls

A yeast‑leavened roll made with boiled potatoes, flour, eggs, sugar, milk, and fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Elizabeth Lyles Wilson (1860–1924) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

My Special Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Cook well-done Irish potatoes until they amount to one and a half cups when run through a ricer.

  2. Dissolve one cake of yeast in one cup of tepid water.

  3. To the potatoes, add two lightly beaten eggs, one-half cup of sugar, and the yeast mixture.

  4. Add one cup of flour and one cup of sweet milk alternately, beating with an egg whisk.

  5. If necessary, add more flour to make the mixture as thick as batter for cakes.

  6. Let the batter rise to twice its bulk in a warm place free from drafts.

Shape and bake

  1. Make a smooth dough by adding one quart of flour, one heaping teaspoon of salt, and one cooking spoonful of fat.

  2. Roll out the dough, cut with a biscuit cutter, and place the pieces into a greased pan.

  3. Grease the tops, cover, let rise for one hour, then bake.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

731Calories
27 gProtein
14 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
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot 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 Mary Elizabeth Lyles Wilson (1860–1924). 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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 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. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Potatoes (in the method)
Add moisture and starch that give the rolls a soft, tender crumb.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the batter and dough rise.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping bind the batter and set the crumb.
Flour
Forms gluten with the liquid to give the dough its structure.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and richness, along with a softer, browner crust.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning to the crust.

The step that matters

Letting the batter rise to twice its bulk. The yeast needs a warm, draft-free spot to ferment steadily. Too cold slows the rise, and drafts can cause uneven or collapsed rolls. Rising fully before shaping gives the rolls their light texture.

“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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