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Dessert

Bath Buns

Sweet yeast buns flavored with caraway comfits, candied peel, and lemon essence.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and caraway match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,435 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Bath Buns

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast in ½ cup of tepid water.

  2. Mix the eggs and ½ lb of flour into the yeast mixture, then beat it in a bowl.

  3. Let the mixture rise in a warm place.

Enrich the dough

  1. Rub the butter into the remaining 1 lb of flour.

  2. Add the sugar.

  3. Mix in some comfits and diced candied peel.

  4. Combine all ingredients.

  5. Cover with a cloth.

  6. Let rise again.

Shape and bake

  1. Grease a baking tin.

  2. Shape the buns.

  3. Place the buns on the tin.

  4. Brush the buns with a mixture of egg yolk and milk.

  5. Sprinkle the buns with comfits.

  6. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 20 minutes.

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. Flour + carawaytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Caraway + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together270 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 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. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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
Forms the gluten structure that holds the buns' shape and crumb.
Compressed yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become light.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and gives a rich flavour.
Egg yolks
Enrich the dough and, brushed on top, help the crust brown and shine.
Sugar nibs
Add sweetness and feed the yeast during rising.

The step that matters

Let rise again. The second rise lets the dough expand fully before baking. Under-proofed dough bakes dense and heavy, while over-proofed dough can collapse and lose its shape.

Swap the caraway

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Carawaythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, egg, lemon. 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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