Name: Sponge Cream Box
Ingredients: freshly baked sponge cake; walnut meats, finely broken; whipped cream; fresh fruit (optional)

Why it works: Walnut and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,035 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Sponge Cream Box

Ingredients

freshly baked sponge cake
walnut meats, finely broken
whipped cream
fresh fruit (optional)

Directions

Ensure the sponge cake is cold before preparing.
Cut a square piece of sponge cake, 2 inches thick, large enough to serve the desired number of people.
Hollow out the center, leaving a thick shell to maintain its shape.
Crumble the removed cake parts and mix with finely broken walnut meats.
Add a little whipped cream to the mixture and fill the shell.
Cover the top and sides of the shell with whipped cream.
For individual servings, prepare smaller cakes in the same manner.
Optionally, use fresh fruit instead of nuts.

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.

Walnut + meattop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,035 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Walnut + creamtop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,982 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Meat + creamtop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,248 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).