8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (2024)

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8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (1)

One of the reasons I love baking so much is that it requires only a few simple, shelf-stable ingredients to make something way more delicious than the sum of its parts. Sugar, flour, butter, salt, and eggs—that’s all you need to treat yourself.

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You might not even need all five, but as long as you have some of these on hand you can transform them endlessly. These ingredients are no doubt sitting in your refrigerators and pantry already, so here are 8 easy things you could make using these versatile ingredients.

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Shortbread

Shortbread

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (2)

For the beginner baker, starting with a shortbread is the perfect way to discover just how much a few simple ingredients can work wonders. This simple shortbread only requires three ingredients, and not a whole lot of other skills, besides a good eye and/or nose for when to remove them from the oven. In fact, it’s fair to say that shortbread cookies are perhaps the least intimidating cookie ever made.

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Pound Cake

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (3)

How could a cake with a literal pound of butter in it be anything but heavenly? It can’t. Pound cake is one of the oldest and simplest bakes in history, and TikTok user @bdylanhollis shows us just how easy it is to follow a pound cake recipe from 1904. Sure, half the cake sticks to the pan, but those are small tweaks that can be worked out. The point is that a pound of butter leads to a guaranteed tasty cake.

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Arepas

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (4)

Arepas are a traditional food made from three ingredients: corn flour (cornmeal), water, and salt, explains Familia Kitchen. In Venezuela these fluffy little dough pockets are usually stuffed with a long list of fillings, from breakfast (eggs, tomato, onion) to seafood (octopus). Alternatively, a simple arepa can be enjoyed all on its own after it’s been cooked on a griddle or popped in the oven.

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Cream puffs

Cream puffs

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (5)

A French croquembouche is the perfect example of how the simplest of ingredients can come together to make a dazzling showstopper. A tower of caramel cream puffs held together by a caramel drizzle can all be made using the core five ingredients: butter, flour, sugar, salt, and eggs. Although this particular baked centerpiece requires more skill than others, and some clever substitutions to keep things at five ingredients, there’s no denying how incredible it is that you could assemble every piece of it with pantry staples.

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Puff Pastry

Puff Pastry

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (6)

Puff pastry is hard, but the widely accepted shortcut, rough puff, is a wonderful base for so many different baked goods. When it comes to this pastry dough, it’s all about the folding that leads to buttery, flaky layers. Once you have the technique down, everything else should be smooth sailing. Working with pastry dough can be both an upper body workout and an opportunity for creativity. Hard to believe rough puff only requires butter, flour, salt, and water.

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Swiss roll

Swiss roll

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (7)

Every bit of a Swiss roll, from cake to filling, can be made using these five standard ingredients, as demonstrated by TikTok user @benjaminthebaker. This TikTok recipe even goes the extra mile by browning the butter and torching the meringue to give a little extra flavor to an otherwise plain sponge cake. What truly matters here is the way you whisk and manipulate both the egg yolks and whites to create this perfect spiral roll. (You can always add vanilla extract for flavor if you don’t have a torch—but then it’s not a five-ingredient cake, now is it?)

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Paratha

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (8)

Plain paratha is a commonly eaten food in India. Most often it is served stuffed with spiced potatoes, vegetables, paneer, lentils, or a combination of fillings. However, the paratha itself made using just wholemeal flour or wheat flour, butter (clarified into ghee), and salt. Making paratha actually requires a specific folding method like puff pastry does, and it’s a process that is very satisfying to watch.

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Flour tortillas

Flour tortillas

8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (9)

I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again: kneading tortilla dough is just as therapeutic as kneading bread. Although making flour tortillas usually requires a mix of flour, vegetable shortening, warm or hot water, and salt, you can substitute butter in for the vegetable shortening and still end up with a great tortilla. Just remember to go slow with adding the water so that you don’t end up with a soupy dough.

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8 Recipes That Only Need Sugar, Flour, Butter, Salt, and Eggs (2024)

FAQs

What is a sweet food made with flour, eggs, fat, and sugar? ›

The Cambridge dictionary defines cake as “A sweet food made from flour, eggs, fat, and sugar mixed together and baked”.

What is made by combining water or another liquid butter flour and eggs into a smooth batter? ›

What Is Pâte à Choux? Choux is a multi-purpose "paste" that hovers somewhere between dough and batter. It's made by cooking flour with water and/or milk and butter, then mixing in eggs off heat to form a pipe-able, spoonable consistency.

What if I need 3 eggs and only have 2? ›

One option is to use 2 eggs and add an extra 1/4 cup of liquid, such as milk or water, to make up for the missing egg. Another option is to use 2 eggs and add in 1/4 cup of unsweetened applesauce or mashed banana to add moisture and binding properties.

When a recipe calls for three eggs and I want to half the recipe? ›

If a recipe calls for 3 eggs and you want to divide the recipe by 1/2, you'll need 1 1/2 eggs. The "one" part is easy—it's right there at your fingertips. The 1/2 egg can be measured out by whisking another egg and using only 1/2 of it, or by using 2 tablespoons.

What type of cake is made from egg sugar and flour only? ›

I don't like sponge cakes with butter because I feel that it hardens the next day. I thought that it would taste better with just the basic ingredients, so I made it with minimal ingredients. Be careful not to cook the egg when you are using the double boiler.

What dessert is made from egg whites and sugar? ›

Pavlova (Egg White Meringue Dessert) Recipe.

What is a paste mixture made of flour fat and water? ›

pastry | Intermediate English

A pastry is also a sweet, baked food made of a mixture of flour, fat, and water and often filled with fruit or cream: [ C ] We were offered a selection of pastries for dessert.

What is the simplest and most common pastry? ›

Shortcrust pastry is the simplest and most common pastry. It is made with flour, fat, butter, salt, and water to bind the dough.

Can I eat eggs 3x a day? ›

Three eggs a day is perfectly fine to eat, but it is important to look at the rest of the diet. If your background diet is high in saturated fat this can affect the degree to which blood cholesterol is increased when more dietary cholesterol is eaten.

Is it OK to have 2 eggs? ›

Although few studies have been conducted on how many eggs are healthy to have on a daily basis, eating 1-2 eggs a day appears to be safe for healthy adults. If you have heart disease, high cholesterol, or diabetes, however, you should watch your overall cholesterol and saturated fat intake.

Can I skip eggs in a recipe? ›

Here's what you can use to substitute for eggs in baking and how.
  1. Avocado. ...
  2. Baking Powder and Oil. ...
  3. Mashed Banana. ...
  4. Nut Butters. ...
  5. Aquafaba. ...
  6. Chia Seeds. ...
  7. Flaxseed. ...
  8. Condensed Milk.

Can you make cake with 2 eggs instead of 3? ›

Eggs are responsible for giving baked goods structure, which means the amount you use directly affects the resulting texture. Using too few eggs will make your desserts dense, but using too many will make them rubbery. The explanation for this lies in the fact that eggs are made up of protein.

What if recipe calls for 2 large eggs and I only have medium? ›

Two large eggs: If your recipe requires two large eggs, you can substitute two eggs of either medium, extra-large or jumbo size. The only amount adjustment necessary is if you have small eggs instead, in which case, you should use three.

What are sweets and fats foods? ›

The small tip of the Pyramid shows fats, oils, and sweets. These are foods such as salad dressings, cream, butter, margarine, sugars, soft drinks, candies, and sweet desserts. Alcoholic beverages are also part of this group. These foods provide calories but few vitamins and minerals.

What are examples of fats and sweets? ›

Fats and oils like salad dressings, mayonnaise, butter, margarine and lard tend to be high in calories because of the fat they contain. Sweets like candy, soft drinks, syrups, jams, and jellies are made mostly of sugars. Most of these foods do not contain many vitamins or minerals.

What food is rich in fats and sugar? ›

Syrup for mashed banana and cinnamon in porridge Puddings, cakes, and pastries for fruit loaf, scones or fruit Coconut oil, butter, and ghee for rapeseed or olive oil Fatty/salty savoury snacks for oatcakes or rye crackers with houmous Salt for black pepper, herbs and spices when cooking to add flavour!

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