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Dessert

Raised Doughnuts

Raised doughnuts made from sponge bread dough, sugar, eggs, cinnamon, and fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Raised Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Combine the sponge with warm water, eggs, sugar, salt, and cinnamon.

  2. Mix well and knead in flour as you would for bread.

  3. Let the dough rise until light.

Fry

  1. Cut the dough into shapes and fry in hot lard.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Bread + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,371 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

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

  4. Bread + cinnamontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,705 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Sponge
Provides the leavening and yeasty structure that makes the dough rise light.
Eggs
Add richness and structure, helping the dough hold its shape and tenderness.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the doughnuts brown evenly in the hot fat.
Lard
Fries the doughnuts, giving a crisp exterior and rich flavor.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until light. Under-proofed dough stays dense and greasy after frying, while over-proofed dough can collapse or absorb excess oil. The dough should look airy and spring back gently when pressed.

Swap the cinnamon

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

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Cinnamonthe original
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

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