Name: Orange Cake
Ingredients: 8 eggs; 1 ¼ pounds powdered sugar; 1 ½ pounds flour; 2 pounds butter; 1 pint milk; 2 teaspoons cream of tartar; 1 teaspoon baking soda; Rind and juice of 1 large orange or 2 small oranges; Rind and juice of ½ lemon; 2 pounds powdered sugar (for icing); Juice of 2 lemons (if using sweet oranges)

Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

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.

Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,634 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs: Beaten eggs add structure and lift to the cake batter.
Butter: Creamed butter adds richness and a tender crumb.
Flour: Flour forms the cake's structure as the batter sets in the oven.
Cream of tartar: Reacts with baking soda to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Baking soda: Reacts with cream of tartar to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Powdered sugar: Sweetens the cake and the icing, and helps give a fine texture.

The step that matters

Quickly add the sifted flour after pouring in the foaming milk. The cream of tartar and baking soda release gas as soon as they meet the liquid, so the flour should go in right away to trap that gas before it escapes and the cake loses its rise.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, flour, butter, milk, cream, lemon):

Vanillafits better
Raisinfits better
Figfits better
Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, flour, butter, milk, cream, lemon. 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.

Orange Cake

Orange Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake

Make the icing and assemble