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Parker House Rolls

A yeast roll made with milk, sugar, lard or butter, flour, and salt, baked at 400°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Parker House Rolls

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 ↓

Parker House Rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast and sugar in lukewarm milk.

  2. Add the melted lard or butter and 1½ pints of flour. Beat until smooth.

  3. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour, or until light.

  4. Add the remaining flour, or enough to make a dough, and the salt. Knead well.

  5. Place in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place for about 1½ hours, or until doubled in bulk.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out to ¼ inch thick. Brush lightly with butter.

  2. Cut with a 2-inch biscuit cutter, crease through the center with a dull knife, and fold over in a pocketbook shape.

  3. Place in well-greased shallow pans, 1 inch apart. Cover and let rise until light, about 45 minutes.

  4. Bake for 10 minutes in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C).

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Butter + flourtop 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. Sugar + flourtop 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).

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

Yeast
Ferments the dough, producing gas that makes it rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the rolls their structure.
Milk
Adds moisture and liquid that hydrates the flour and yeast.
Lard or butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and helps browning.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the crust.

The step that matters

Knead well, then let the dough rise until doubled. Kneading develops the gluten that traps the gas yeast produces. Letting the dough fully rise before shaping gives the rolls their light, open texture, and under-proofing leaves them dense.

“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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