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Breakfast Rolls

A quick oven-baked roll made with flour, butter, milk, sugar, salt, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Breakfast Rolls

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Breakfast Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt.

  3. Cut in the butter or lard until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

  4. Add the milk gradually, stirring until a soft dough forms.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the dough into small balls or flat round cakes.

  2. For flat cakes, butter the top and fold them over slightly.

  3. Place on a baking sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes 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.

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.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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
Provides the structure that holds the rolls together as they bake.
Butter or lard
Cut into the flour to create tender layers and a crumbly texture.
Milk
Hydrates the flour to form a soft dough and adds moisture and browning.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the rolls rise and become light.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness and helps the crust brown.

The step that matters

Cut in the butter or lard until coarse crumbs form. Fat coated onto flour particles limits gluten formation, so cutting it in to a coarse crumb keeps the rolls tender. Overworking the dough once milk is added develops gluten and makes the rolls tough.

“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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