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German Puffs

German Puffs are small baked pastries made from a batter of flour, cream, eggs, sugar, cinnamon, butter, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and walnut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,147 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

German Puffs

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Make a smooth batter with flour and a little cream.

  2. Beat the yolks of the eggs separately.

  3. Beat the whites of the eggs separately.

  4. Mix the beaten yolks and whites with the batter.

  5. Add sugar, cinnamon, and salt to the mixture.

  6. Melt the butter in a little cream.

  7. Let the melted butter cool.

  8. Mix the cooled butter into the batter.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter small moulds.

  2. Fill the moulds half full with batter.

  3. Bake for 10 minutes at 350°F (175°C).

  4. Serve with wine sauce.

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. Cinnamon + walnuttop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Eggs
Yolks and whipped whites give the puffs their light, airy structure as they set.
Flour
Forms the batter base that gives the puffs body and holds their shape.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing tenderness and flavour to the batter.

The step that matters

Fill the moulds half full. Puffs rise considerably in the oven, so filling only halfway leaves room for the batter to expand without overflowing or collapsing.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits better
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, cream, egg, sugar, cinnamon, 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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