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Oatmeal Rolls

A yeast-based roll made with rolled oats, milk, butter, sugar, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Oatmeal Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dough

  1. Scald the milk and pour it over the rolled oats.

  2. Add the butter, sugar, and salt to the mixture.

  3. Once cool, add the yeast dissolved in lukewarm water, beaten egg whites, and enough flour to knead well.

  4. Let the dough rise until it doubles in size.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the dough into small rolls and let them rise again.

  2. Bake the rolls until golden.

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. Oats + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Milk + oatstop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,119 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Rolled oats
Soak up the scalded milk, giving the dough a soft, tender crumb and a nutty flavor.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars in the dough, producing gas that makes the rolls rise.
Egg whites
Add protein that adds structure and helps the rolls hold their shape and rise.
Butter
Adds fat, which softens the crumb and adds richness to the rolls.
Milk
Adds moisture and milk proteins that help the crumb stay soft and promote browning.

The step that matters

Adding the yeast only once the mixture has cooled. Yeast is killed by high heat, so the scalded milk and oat mixture must cool before the yeast goes in. Adding it too hot can stop the dough from rising.

“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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