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Yeast buns flavored with coriander and caraway seeds, brushed with egg, milk, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Coriander and caraway match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 185 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-decenal, which smells green, must. The science ↓

Buns

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, combine the flour and warm milk. Mix in the yeast and cover the bowl; let it rise in a warm place for at least 1 hour.

  2. Once risen, work in the sugar, butter, coriander, and caraway seeds until well combined.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the mixture into buns and place them on a baking sheet.

  2. Bake in a brisk oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden brown.

  3. Remove from the oven and immediately brush the buns with a mixture of egg, milk, and sugar.

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. Coriander + carawaytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together185 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-decenal (green, must).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Fine flour
Forms the structure of the dough that holds the buns together.
Light yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the crumb and gives a rich texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown in the oven.
Egg
Glazing egg gives the finished buns a shiny, browned surface.

The step that matters

Brush the buns immediately after baking. The glaze is meant to be applied while the buns are hot so it soaks in slightly and sets into a glossy coating; waiting lets the surface cool and the glaze stay on top.

Swap the coriander

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Corianderthe original

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