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Chocolate Doughnuts

A fried doughnut flavored with chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder.

  2. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs, then add the sugar, melted butter, milk, and vanilla.

  3. Gradually mix in the dry ingredients until the dough is just stiff enough to handle.

  4. Roll out the dough on a floured surface to ½ inch thick.

Fry and finish

  1. Cut with a doughnut cutter and fry in deep hot lard until golden brown.

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.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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 network that gives the doughnuts their structure.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the dough bind and set when fried.
Baking powder
Releases gas during cooking, helping the doughnuts rise and turn light.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the surface brown during frying.
Milk
Supplies moisture that hydrates the flour and keeps the dough tender.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.

The step that matters

Frying in deep hot lard until golden brown. Oil temperature controls both browning and cooking through. If the lard is too cool, the dough absorbs grease and turns heavy. If it is too hot, the outside browns before the centre cooks.

“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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