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 ↓
Rock Cakes
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.
Prepare the dough
Preheat the oven to 350 °F (175 °C).
In a large bowl, mix the sugar and butter until creamy.
Add the ammonia and milk, then mix well.
Incorporate the eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition.
Gradually add the flour and currants, mixing until combined.
Shape and bake
Break the dough into pieces like gingernuts.
Shape the pieces and place them on baking pans.
Use a rock cake stamp to press down on each piece.
Bake in the preheated oven until golden brown.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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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).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the dough together as it bakes.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and add structure and moisture.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cakes and helps them brown as they bake.
- Ammonia
- Acts as a leavening agent, releasing gas that lifts the dough.
- Currants
- Add sweetness and chewy fruit pieces throughout the cake.
The step that matters
Bake until golden brown. Baking too briefly leaves the centre doughy, while overbaking dries the cakes out. Golden brown colour signals that the sugars have caramelised and the crust has set.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, egg, flour):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Currantthe 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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