Name: Old Time Strawberry Shortcake
Ingredients: rich yeast powder biscuit dough (about 1 inch thick); butter (for spreading); finest strawberries (for decoration); sugar (for sugaring berries); whipped cream (sweetened)

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Old Time Strawberry Shortcake

Ingredients

rich yeast powder biscuit dough (about 1 inch thick)
butter (for spreading)
finest strawberries (for decoration)
sugar (for sugaring berries)
whipped cream (sweetened)

Directions

Bake the shortcake until golden brown.
Split the baked shortcake in half and butter both sides while hot.
Reserve the finest strawberries for decoration and cut the others in half.
Sugar the halved strawberries and let them sit for 4 to 5 hours.
Layer the sugared strawberries and their juice between the two halves of the shortcake.
Spread sweetened whipped cream on top and add the reserved fresh strawberries.

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 + 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).
Biscuit + creamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,235 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Biscuit + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,009 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Biscuit + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,874 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).