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Dessert

Buns

A yeast dough bun flavored with brandy, rose water, currants, and spices, topped with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

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. In a large bowl, rub together the flour and butter until fine.

  2. Add the yeast, brandy and rose-water mixture, beaten eggs, currants, spices, and warm milk. Mix until combined and let rise for 5 hours, covered with a close-fitting tin cover.

  3. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 2 minutes, adding flour if it sticks.

Shape and rise

  1. Divide the dough into small sections and roll each into a ball.

  2. Place the balls in a greased pan, allowing the edges to touch.

  3. Cover with another greased pan and let rise for 3 hours.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for 15-20 minutes.

  2. Sift powdered sugar over the buns as soon as they come out of the oven.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Brandy + curranttop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Rose + curranttop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together494 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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 structure of the dough that holds the buns together.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and enriches the flavour.
Yeast
Produces gas during the long rise, making the buns light and airy.
Eggs
Add richness, moisture and structure to the dough.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and helps the dough become soft and elastic.

The step that matters

Long rise before shaping. The five-hour rise lets yeast produce gas and develop flavour. Under-proofing leaves the buns dense, while over-proofing can cause them to collapse in the oven.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, brandy, rose, egg, nutmeg, cinnamon):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, brandy, rose, egg, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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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