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Dessert

Plain Doughnuts

A simple doughnut made with sugar, eggs, milk, flour, baking powder, nutmeg or cinnamon, and fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Plain Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, mix sugar, eggs, and milk until well combined.

  2. Add baking powder, nutmeg or cinnamon, salt, and flour gradually to form a soft dough.

  3. Knead the dough lightly.

  4. Let it rise until doubled in size, about 5 hours.

  5. Roll out the dough on a floured surface.

  6. Cut into desired shapes.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat lard in a deep pan until boiling.

  2. Drop the doughnuts into the hot lard.

  3. Fry until golden brown on both sides.

  4. Remove the doughnuts from the lard.

  5. Drain on paper towels before serving.

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. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the gluten structure that gives the dough its body and chew.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping bind the dough and add tenderness.
Baking powder
Releases gas during rising, giving the doughnuts a light, airy texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the dough and helps browning.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the fried exterior brown.
Lard
Transfers heat for frying, cooking the doughnuts and giving a golden crust.

The step that matters

Frying in hot lard. If the lard is not hot enough, doughnuts absorb excess fat and turn greasy; if it is too hot, the outside browns before the inside cooks through.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Jalapenofits less well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, milk, flour. 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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