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 ↓
Loaf Cake
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 batter
Cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the sweet milk and 1 cup of flour, mixing well.
Incorporate the beaten egg whites.
Finally, add the remaining cup of flour and the baking powder.
If desired, fold in the chopped walnuts.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + walnuttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,873 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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
- Creams with the sugar to trap air and add richness and tenderness.
- Egg whites
- Add structure and lift as they set in the oven.
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the cake as the proteins set during baking.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, helping the loaf rise and become light.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender crumb when creamed with butter.
The step that matters
Incorporate the beaten egg whites gently. Egg whites hold air that gives the loaf its lift. Overmixing after adding the flour can knock out that air and develop gluten, making the cake dense and tough.
Swap the walnut
The recipe marks walnut as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, egg, flour):
- Almondfits better
- Chestnutfits about as well
- Milletfits about as well
- Walnutthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, egg, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“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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