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Plain Rolls

Plain rolls are yeast-leavened rolls made with milk, butter, sugar, salt, flour, and yeast.

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 ↓

Plain 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 sponge

  1. Scald the milk.

  2. Pour the scalded milk over the butter, sugar, and salt.

  3. Let the mixture cool.

  4. Dissolve the yeast cake in lukewarm water.

  5. Add the dissolved yeast to the mixture.

  6. Stir in the flour to make a sponge and beat well.

  7. Let the sponge rise until light.

Knead and shape

  1. Add enough flour to knead the dough.

  2. Knead thoroughly.

  3. Set aside to rise.

  4. Punch the dough down.

  5. Shape the dough into rolls.

  6. Let the rolls rise again.

Bake

  1. Bake the rolls in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C).

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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough structure and a chewy crumb.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars in the dough, producing gas that makes the rolls rise.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness, and its milk proteins and sugars help the crust brown.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the crumb and gives a tender texture.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the crust.

The step that matters

Let the sponge rise until light. The sponge must ferment long enough for the yeast to build gas and activity. Underproofing leaves dense rolls, while the flour added later develops the gluten needed for structure.

“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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