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Dessert

Cream Puffs

A light pastry made from a dough of water, butter, flour, baking powder, and eggs, baked until puffed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Cream Puffs

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. In a saucepan, combine boiling water and butter until melted.

  2. Stir in flour and baking powder until well mixed.

  3. Let the mixture cool slightly.

  4. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto a buttered baking pan.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 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. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the puffs once the eggs and steam expand them.
Eggs
Add structure and moisture, and help the dough puff and set as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat and richness and softens the dough for a tender texture.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the oven to help the puffs rise.

The step that matters

Adding the eggs one at a time. Each egg must be fully blended before the next goes in, so the dough stays smooth and glossy. Adding them all at once can leave it split or too loose to hold its shape and puff properly.

“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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