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Potato Rolls

A yeast-based roll made with mashed potatoes, flour, eggs, butter, milk, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Potato Rolls

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Potato Rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Beat together mashed potatoes, flour, eggs, lukewarm water, butter, milk, and salt in a large bowl.

  2. Let the mixture rise for 2 hours.

  3. Make the dough stiff, then let the dough rise for another 1½ hours.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll the dough into sheets 1 inch thick.

  2. Cut the dough with a biscuit cutter.

  3. Place the cut dough into a pan.

  4. Let the rolls rise for 1½ hours.

  5. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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

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

  2. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Mashed potatoes
Add moisture and a soft, tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that holds the rolls together.
Eggs
Add structure, richness, and help bind the dough.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavor.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, and helps browning.
Compressed yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise fully before shaping. Yeast needs time to produce enough gas to lighten the dough. Rising too little leaves dense rolls, while rising too long can weaken the structure and make them collapse or taste sour.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, egg, butter, milk):

  1. Chivefits about as well
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, egg, butter, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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