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Dessert

Raised Doughnuts

A sweet fried dough made from a light bread sponge, sugar, eggs, butter, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Raised Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a large bowl, mix the bread sponge, sugar, eggs, and butter until very soft.

  2. Add the nutmeg.

  3. Let the mixture rise.

  4. Mould the dough again.

Shape and fry

  1. Roll it out.

  2. Cut into desired shapes.

  3. Place on a board to rise until light.

  4. Fry in moderately hot lard until golden brown.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Bread sponge
Provides the yeast-leavened base that makes the dough rise and become light.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the doughnuts brown in the hot lard.
Eggs
Add structure and richness to the soft dough.
Butter
Adds fat, softening the dough and giving a tender texture.
Nutmeg
Adds warm aroma to the dough.

The step that matters

Place on a board to rise until light. The shaped dough needs enough time to rise before frying; underproofed doughnuts stay dense and can absorb more oil, while the rise gives them a light, airy crumb.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits less well
  4. Parsleyfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, sugar, egg, butter. 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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