Name: Rice Waffles
Ingredients: 9 large eggs; 9 tablespoons all-purpose flour; 1 teaspoon salt; 1 teacup boiled rice, very soft; 1½ pints milk; Lard for greasing

Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Rice Waffles

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

Beat the eggs well in a large bowl.
Mix in the flour and salt.
Add the cooled, boiled rice and combine thoroughly.
Stir in the milk until the mixture is smooth.

Bake and serve

Grease the waffle irons with lard.
Fill the irons with the batter and bake until golden brown.
Serve with butter.

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.

Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,374 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + ricetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,611 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Flour and milk 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 and richness as they set in the iron.
All-purpose flour: Provides starch and gluten that give the waffles body and a set crumb.
Boiled rice: Adds moisture and a tender, soft texture to the batter.
Milk: Thins the batter to a pourable consistency and adds moisture and browning from its sugars.

“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.