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Dessert

Rice Muffins

Rice muffins made with flour, boiled rice, milk, butter, salt, and eggs, baked until light buff.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Rice Muffins

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.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix the flour, boiled rice, milk, butter, salt, and beaten eggs until smooth.

Cook the muffins

  1. Grease muffin rings and place them on a heated griddle.

  2. Fill each ring halfway with the batter and let them rise to the top.

  3. Gently turn them over with a cake turner when risen.

  4. Bake until they are a light buff color.

Finish and serve

  1. Once cooked, split each muffin in half, toast them lightly, and butter well.

  2. Serve hot on a folded napkin.

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

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

  2. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the batter together as the muffins set.
Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set firm while giving the muffins body.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps the batter spread and brown lightly.
Boiled rice
Adds moisture and a soft, tender crumb to the muffins.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and flavor, and softens the crumb.

The step that matters

Turning the muffins when risen. Turning them too early, before the surface has set, can deflate the batter or tear the soft top. Waiting until the muffins have risen and firmed gives them a stable shape for the turn and even colour on the second side.

“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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