Name: Lemon Short-cake
Ingredients: 2 cups all-purpose flour; ½ cup butter; 1 cup and ¼ cup water; 1 cup and ½ cup sugar; 2 lemons; 3 crackers

Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Short-cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

Make a rich biscuit dough using the above recipe.

Make the lemon filling

While baking, combine 1¼ cups water, 1½ cups sugar, and the juice and pulp of 2 lemons in a pot.
Boil the mixture for a short time.
Stir in 3 finely rolled crackers.

Assemble and serve

Split the short-cakes while hot, spread with butter, then with the lemon mixture.
Serve warm.

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.

Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together30,404 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter 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

All-purpose flour: Forms the main structure of the biscuit dough.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and tenderness in the shortcake and a buttery layer.
Sugar: Sweetens the lemon mixture and helps balance its acidity.
Lemons: Supply acidity and aroma from the juice and pulp for the filling.
Crackers: Break down into the filling and thicken the lemon mixture.