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Dessert

Cream Doughnuts

A doughnut made from a sour cream and buttermilk dough flavored with cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Buttermilk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Cream Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, mix sour cream, buttermilk, sugar, eggs, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon until well combined.

  2. Gradually add flour until the dough is soft but not sticky.

  3. Roll out the dough.

Shape and fry

  1. Cut the rolled dough into strips.

  2. Twist the strips into doughnut shapes.

  3. Fry the doughnuts immediately in hot oil 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. Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Buttermilk + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. 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

What each ingredient does

Sour cream
Adds fat and moisture, giving the doughnuts a tender crumb.
Buttermilk
Adds moisture and acidity that works with the baking soda to lighten the dough.
Eggs
Provide structure and richness that hold the dough together.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic buttermilk and sour cream to produce gas that helps the doughnuts rise.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the doughnuts brown when fried.

The step that matters

Fry the doughnuts immediately in hot oil. Once shaped, the dough begins to lose its leavening gas, so frying right away helps it puff. Oil that is too cool lets the doughnuts absorb grease and turn heavy, while oil that is too hot browns the outside before the inside cooks.

Swap the cinnamon

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Jalapenofits about as well
  3. Cinnamonthe original
  4. Tarragonfits less well

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

“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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