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Dessert

Breakfast Doughnuts

A fried doughnut made with brown sugar, butter, eggs, baking powder, rolled oats, vanilla, flour, and fried in hot lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Oats and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,532 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Breakfast Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, mix brown sugar, butter, eggs, baking powder, rolled oats, and vanilla.

  2. Gradually add flour until a soft dough forms.

Fry

  1. Heat lard in a deep pan.

  2. Fry spoonfuls of dough in 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. Oats + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + oatstop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Vanilla + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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
Bind the dough and add richness and structure as they set in the frying.
Baking powder
Releases gas that makes the doughnuts rise and turn light.
Rolled oats
Provide the bulk and chewy texture of the dough.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the outside brown during frying.
Butter
Adds fat for flavour and a tender crumb.
Flour
Gives the dough enough body to hold its shape in the pan.

The step that matters

Fry spoonfuls of dough in hot lard until golden brown. If the lard is not hot enough, the doughnuts absorb grease and turn heavy and oily; if it is too hot, the outside browns before the centre cooks through. Steady heat gives even colour and a cooked interior.

“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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