Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Plain Pastry
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
In a large bowl, mix the flour, shortening, and baking powder.
Gradually add water until the mixture reaches the right consistency.
Knead the dough gently until smooth.
Shape
Roll out the dough to fit your pie dishes.
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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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 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
- All-purpose flour
- Forms the structure of the dough once hydrated and kneaded.
- Shortening
- Coats flour particles to keep the pastry tender and flaky.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the oven to give the pastry a slight lift.
The step that matters
Gradually add water until the mixture reaches the right consistency.. Adding water slowly lets you stop once the dough just holds together. Too much water lets gluten develop and makes the pastry tough, while too little makes it crumbly and hard to roll.
“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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