Skip to main content
Dessert

Raised Doughnuts

A yeast-based doughnut made with butter or lard, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, eggs, and flour, fried and dusted with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg 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 ↓

Raised Doughnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sponge

  1. Make a sponge by mixing warm water or milk with yeast.

  2. When the sponge is very light, add butter or lard, sugar, salt, baking soda dissolved in a little water, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

  3. Stir in the beaten eggs and enough sifted flour to achieve biscuit dough consistency.

Shape and rise

  1. Knead the dough well, cover, and let it rise.

  2. Roll the dough out to a ½ inch thickness and cut into small rounds or strips.

  3. Place on greased tins, cover, and let rise again before frying.

Fry and finish

  1. Heat lard in a pot and drop in the dough pieces when hot.

  2. Fry until golden brown, then dust with powdered sugar while warm.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + biscuittop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together368 recipes

    Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).

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

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

  4. Cinnamon + biscuittop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together312 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Yeast
Ferments the sponge, producing gas that makes the dough light and airy as it rises.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the dough hold its shape and turn tender.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its body and structure.
Butter or sweet lard
Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavor in the dough.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and help with golden browning when fried.
Baking soda
Reacts with the dough's acidity to add lift and a softer crumb.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise before frying. Yeast needs time to produce gas and expand the dough. Frying before the pieces have risen fully leaves them dense and heavy, and frying in oil that is not hot enough lets them absorb grease instead of crisping.

“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.

You might also like

Baking Powder BiscuitBaking Powder Biscuit119 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipesSour Milk BiscuitSour Milk Biscuit27 recipes