Why it works: Milk and wheat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓
Egg Dumplings for Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine the milk and beaten eggs.
Add enough wheat flour to create a smooth, thick batter without lumps.
Alternatively, mix 1 cup sour cream, 1 cup sour milk, and 3 beaten eggs (whites and yolks separately).
Dissolve 1 teaspoon baking soda in a spoonful of water and add to the mixture.
Add enough flour to make a very stiff batter.
Cook
Drop tablespoonfuls of the batter into boiling soup.
Drop spoonfuls into the broth and boil for 20 minutes, or until no raw dough is visible.
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.
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Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,418 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
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Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,373 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure as they set during cooking.
- Wheat flour
- Provides the starch and gluten that give the dumplings body and hold their shape.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with acid in the batter to release gas, helping the dumplings lighten.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and softness, loosening the flour into a batter.
The step that matters
Boil until no raw dough is visible. Dumplings are thick and dense, so the centre cooks slowly. Boiling for the full time sets the starches and proteins through, preventing a gummy or raw middle.
“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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