Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Old-fashioned Pound 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.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
Cream the butter in a large bowl.
Gradually add the flour, mixing well.
Add the powdered sugar, currants, candied peel, and chopped almonds, and mix thoroughly.
Whisk the egg whites and yolks separately, then add the yolks to the mixture.
Beat the mixture with a wooden spoon for 20 minutes.
Bake
Divide the batter into two round tins lined with buttered paper.
Bake in the preheated oven, covering the tops with buttered paper once they start to rise.
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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Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,673 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,245 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 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
- Butter
- Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the cake a rich, tender crumb.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Powdered sugar
- Sweetens the batter and helps create a fine, even texture when creamed.
- Eggs
- Egg whites add lift and structure, while yolks add richness and binding.
- Currants
- Add fruitiness and chewy texture scattered through the crumb.
The step that matters
Covering the tops with buttered paper once they start to rise. A long bake at 350°F can brown or dry the top before the centre sets. Covering it once it begins to rise shields the surface from direct heat while the inside finishes cooking.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, almond, egg):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sugar, almond, egg. 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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