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 ↓
Peach Fritters
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
Sift the flour into a bowl.
Work the milk and yeast into the flour.
Let the dough rise for 5-6 hours.
Beat the eggs and sugar until light.
Mix the butter and salt into the beaten eggs and sugar.
Stir this mixture into the risen dough.
Knead the dough well.
Shape and rise
Take pieces of dough the size of an egg.
Flatten each piece.
Place a peach in the center of each flattened piece.
Close the dough around the peach to form a ball.
Place the balls on a floured pan for the second rise.
Ensure the balls do not touch each other.
Let the balls rise for 1 hour until light.
Fry and serve
Fry the balls slowly like doughnuts.
Drain the fried balls in a colander.
Serve hot with brandy sauce.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + peachtop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together781 recipes
Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + peachtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together860 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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 its structure and chew.
- Yeast
- Ferments the dough so it rises and becomes light and airy.
- Eggs
- Add richness and structure, helping the dough hold its shape and texture.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavor in the dough.
- Sugar
- Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness with some browning during frying.
- Milk
- Provides moisture and liquid that hydrates the flour and develops the dough.
The step that matters
Fry the balls slowly like doughnuts. Frying slowly lets the dough cook through and set before the outside browns too deeply. Fast frying leaves the centre raw around the peach while the exterior darkens.
Swap the peach
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, milk, sugar, egg, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits about as well
- Peachthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, milk, 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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