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Parker House Rolls

Soft rolls made with sweet milk, lard, butter, sugar, salt, yeast, and flour, baked at 400°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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.

Prepare the dough

  1. Scald the milk.

  2. Add sugar, butter, lard, and salt to the milk.

  3. Add the yeast cake soaked in ¼ cup water to the mixture.

  4. Stir in sifted flour until a soft sponge forms.

  5. Set aside to rise until light and spongy.

  6. Add the remaining flour.

  7. Knead for 20 minutes or 10 minutes in a bread mixer.

  8. Let the dough rise until very light.

Shape the rolls

  1. Roll out the dough.

  2. Spread butter over the rolled dough.

  3. Cut the dough with a biscuit cutter.

  4. Fold over the dough, bringing the edges even.

  5. Place the dough in a tin, not too close together.

  6. Butter the tops after placing them in the tin.

Bake

  1. Let the rolls rise again.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  3. Butter the tops again after baking.

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. Butter + sugartop 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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the rolls their structure.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, and helps the crumb stay tender.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning on the crust.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich flavour.
Lard
Adds fat that keeps the crumb soft and tender.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until very light.. Yeast gas is trapped by the gluten network, so the dough must rise fully to become light. Underproofed rolls stay dense, while overproofed dough can collapse in the oven.

“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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