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Maltese

Maltese Cake

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and 43,450 recipes mention both. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Maltese Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe.

Recipe from a historical cookbook.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Cream + lemontop 30% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together15,640 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Sugar and lemon share little aroma chemistry, yet 53,532 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Flavor stand-ins for the lemon

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

  1. Vanillabetter flavor fit
  2. Strawberrybetter flavor fit
  3. Raspberrybetter flavor fit
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).