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Dessert

Crullers

Crullers are fried dough pastries flavored with nutmeg, cinnamon, and rose water, dusted with loaf sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Crullers

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Cut the butter into the flour.

  2. Add the sugar, nutmeg, and cinnamon and mix well.

  3. Beat the eggs and pour them into the flour mixture.

  4. Add the rose-water and mix into a dough.

  5. If the dough is too dry, add a little cold water.

  6. Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth.

  7. Cut the dough into small pieces and knead each piece separately.

  8. Combine all pieces and knead into one lump.

Shape and fry

  1. Roll out the dough into a large square, about ½ inch thick.

  2. Cut the dough into long narrow strips using a knife.

  3. Twist the strips into various shapes.

  4. Heat melted lard in a pan.

  5. Fry the crullers until light brown, turning gently with a knife and fork.

  6. Once fried, place them on a dish to cool and sprinkle with loaf sugar.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Butter
Rubbed into the flour, it adds richness and tenderness to the dough.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add richness, structure and colour to the crullers.
All-purpose flour
Forms the main structure of the dough once kneaded.
Powdered white sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crullers brown lightly when fried.

The step that matters

Fry the crullers until light brown. Lard must be hot enough to cook the dough through and brown it evenly; turning gently with a knife and fork keeps the delicate twisted shapes from breaking.

“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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