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A sweet yeast roll made with milk, eggs, lard, sugar, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Zwieback

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast and sugar in lukewarm milk.

  2. Add ¾ cup of flour and beat thoroughly.

  3. Cover and set aside in a warm place to rise for 50 minutes.

  4. Add lard, beaten eggs, enough flour to make a dough (about 2 cups), and salt.

  5. Knead the dough and shape it into two rolls, each 1½ inches thick and 15 inches long.

  6. Protect from drafts and let rise until light, about 1½ hours.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a hot oven (400°F) for 12 minutes.

  2. When cool, cut diagonally into ½-inch slices.

  3. Place on a baking sheet and brown in a moderate oven (350°F).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Yeast
Ferments the dough so it rises and becomes light.
Eggs
Add richness and structure to the dough, helping it hold its shape.
Lard
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and softens texture.
Milk
Provides moisture and milk solids that aid browning and softness.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its structure.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning.

The step that matters

Letting the shaped rolls rise until light. Rising develops gas bubbles and gluten structure; rolls that are underproofed stay dense, while overproofed ones can collapse or lose shape in the oven.

“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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