Name: Mrs Miller's Cream Cakes
Ingredients: ½ pound butter; 1 pound flour; 1 teaspoon sugar; ¼ teaspoon salt; 1 quart boiling milk; 10-12 eggs; 1 teaspoon saleratus; ½ teacup thick cream; 1 beaten egg (for brushing)

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Mrs Miller's Cream Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the dough

In a bowl, rub together the butter, flour, sugar, and salt until smooth.
Stir in the boiling milk constantly over heat until it pulls away from the kettle.
Let the mixture cool.
Once cool, add the eggs two at a time, mixing gently.
Dissolve the saleratus in the thick cream and add it to the mixture.

Shape and bake

Drop spoonfuls onto buttered pans, shaping the tops into turban forms.
Brush the tops with the beaten egg.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 20 minutes.

Fill and serve

When done, carefully cut one side open and fill with rich boiled cream custard.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Butter: Adds fat and richness, giving the cakes a tender crumb and flavour.
Flour: Provides the structure that holds the cakes together as they bake.
Boiling milk: Its heat cooks and gelatinises the flour, forming a paste that sets the dough's base.
Eggs: Add structure and moisture, helping the cakes rise and set as they bake.
Saleratus: Acts as a leavening agent, releasing gas that lifts the cakes as they bake.

The step that matters

Stir the boiling milk into the butter and flour. The milk must be stirred constantly over heat until the mixture pulls away from the kettle, because this cooks the flour into a stiff paste. Undercooked paste gives a weak structure that may collapse when the cakes bake.

“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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Mrs Miller's Cream Cakes