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 ↓
Doughnuts
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
In a bowl, mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.
In another bowl, stir the egg into the milk.
Combine the wet and dry ingredients until just mixed, similar to biscuit dough.
Fry
Heat lard in a frying pan.
Shape the dough and fry in the hot lard until golden brown.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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
- All-purpose flour
- Provides the structure that holds the dough together while it fries.
- Egg
- Adds binding and richness, helping the dough hold its shape.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas when mixed and heated, so the doughnuts rise and turn light.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown in the hot fat.
- Lard
- Frying fat that transfers heat quickly, cooking the dough and browning its surface.
The step that matters
Combine the wet and dry ingredients until just mixed. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour, which makes the doughnuts tough and dense. Stopping once the dough comes together keeps them tender.
“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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