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Graham Rolls

A quick, sweet roll made with graham and wheat flour, lard, and sweet milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Graham Rolls

Why it works: Wheat and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Graham Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the dough

  1. Sift together the graham flour, wheat flour, salt, and baking powder.

  2. Rub in the cold lard until well combined.

  3. Add the sweet milk and mix until smooth.

  4. Turn the dough onto a board and knead lightly.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape into rolls the size of a large finger.

  2. Place the rolls in a baking pan, ensuring they do not touch.

  3. Wet the tops with milk and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 10 to 12 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.

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. Wheat + milktop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

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

  2. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk 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

Graham flour
Gives the rolls a coarse, nutty texture and a hearty structure.
Wheat flour
Provides gluten for structure, so the rolls hold their shape and rise.
Baking powder
Releases gas when heated, helping the rolls rise and become light.
Cold lard
Rubbed into the flour, it creates tenderness and a flaky, short crumb.
Sweet milk
Hydrates the flour to form the dough and adds moisture and browning on top.

The step that matters

Rub in the cold lard until well combined. Keeping the lard cold and rubbing it into the flour in small pieces coats the flour particles and limits gluten development, which keeps the rolls tender and flaky rather than tough.

“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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