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Bread

Salad Rolls

A yeast-based roll made with yeast cakes, milk, butter, sugar, and flour, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Salad Rolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick 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 cakes in lukewarm water.

  2. Add the scalded and cooled milk, salt, butter, and sugar.

  3. Stir in enough flour to make a stiff dough and knead for 30 minutes, using as little flour as possible.

Shape and rise

  1. Divide the dough into equal parts for small rolls and shape into balls or finger rolls.

  2. Press a small knife handle through the middle to make cleft rolls if desired.

  3. Place the rolls in a pan, cover with a cloth, and let rise for about 45 minutes.

Bake

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 20 to 40 minutes, depending on size.

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 + 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

Yeast cakes
Ferment the dough, producing gas that makes the rolls rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the stiff dough its structure.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the dough and enriches its crumb.
Butter
Adds fat, which tenderizes the crumb and gives a richer texture.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds a little sweetness and browning in the oven.

The step that matters

Kneading the dough for 30 minutes. Long kneading develops gluten so the dough traps gas and holds its shape. Adding too much flour during kneading makes the rolls dense and dry, so use as little as possible.

“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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