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Dessert

Rice Cake, Without Butter

A lemon-flavored cake made with eggs, sugar, all-purpose flour, rice flour, and lemon zest, baked without butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,366 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

Rice Cake, Without Butter

Oven, in the book's wordsA warm oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a warm oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Separate the egg whites from the yolks.

  2. Whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  3. Mix in the yolks, sugar, and lemon raspings.

  4. Whisk over low heat until thick and light, about 30 minutes.

  5. Remove from heat and whisk until cool.

  6. Stir in the all-purpose flour and rice flour.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into paper-lined cake pans.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until done.

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.

  1. Lemon + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,366 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + ricetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Eggs
Whites trap air for lift, and yolks add richness and structure as the batter sets.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps give the batter body and a tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Rice flour
Adds a lighter, more delicate texture to the crumb than wheat flour alone.
Lemon raspings
Add bright aroma and flavor from the citrus zest.

The step that matters

Whisk over low heat until thick and light. Gentle heat thickens the eggs and sugar slowly, so they reach a thick, airy state without scrambling. Too much heat can curdle the eggs, and too little leaves the batter thin and unable to hold air.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, flour, rice):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, flour, rice. 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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