Name: Cinnamon Rolls
Ingredients: 1 pint light sponge; 2 eggs, beaten light; 1 teacup sugar; ½ cup butter; flour, enough to make a soft bread dough; 1 cup sugar (for filling); ½ cup butter (for filling, beaten to a cream); 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cinnamon Rolls

Ingredients

Directions

In a bowl, combine the light sponge, beaten eggs, sugar, and butter.
Add enough flour to form a soft bread dough and let it rise until very light.
Roll out the dough to about ½ inch thick.
In a separate bowl, mix the sugar, butter, and cinnamon to create a filling.
Spread the filling over the rolled dough, then roll it up like a jelly roll.
Cut the rolled dough into 1-inch thick pieces with a sharp knife.
Place the pieces on greased paper in a pan and let them rise until ready for baking.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,341 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together30,779 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Swap the cinnamon

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

Nutmegfits better
Cinnamonthe original
Capersfits less well
Parsleyfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter, flour, bread, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.