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Dessert

Puffs or Pop-overs

A quick baked batter made with milk, flour, eggs, and salt, baked in hot greased pans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Ronald · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour 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 ↓

Puffs or Pop-overs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Measure 2 cupfuls of milk.

  2. Measure 2 cupfuls of flour.

  3. Beat 2 eggs, separating whites and yolks.

  4. Measure 1 teaspoonful of salt.

  5. Mix the salt with the flour.

  6. Mix the beaten yolks with the milk.

Make the batter

  1. Add the yolk-milk mixture slowly to the flour to make a smooth batter.

  2. Fold in the whipped whites.

  3. Grease hot gem-pans.

  4. Fill the pans half full with batter.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a hot oven for thirty minutes.

  2. Serve immediately, as they fall as soon as the heat is lost.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

682Calories
27 gProtein
14 gFat
108 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

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

By Mary Ronald. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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 + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Milk and flour 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

Eggs
Whites trapped as a foam expand with heat and lift the batter, while yolks enrich it.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the risen batter walls as they set in the oven.
Milk
Supplies the liquid that turns to steam in the hot oven, helping the popovers rise.

The step that matters

Fold in the whipped whites. Folding gently keeps the air in the whipped whites. Stirring or deflating them removes the air that gives the popovers their lift.

“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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