IllustrationWhy it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and 88,465 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Make the frosting
Boil the sugar and cold water until it threads or hairs.
Beat the syrup into the beaten white of one egg.
Continue beating until the frosting is stiff enough to spread.
Cook and finish
Cook the sugar, milk and butter until a ball forms when a little is dropped in water.
Beat until thick and creamy.
Put between the layers and on top of the cake.
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. See the original page.
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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.
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Milk + eggtop 9% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together88,465 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + milktop 9% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together77,855 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + eggtop 10% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together122,252 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and milk share little aroma chemistry, yet 77,855 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
What each ingredient does
- Egg white
- Beaten into the syrup, it traps air and gives the frosting a light, stiff structure.
- Sugar
- Cooked into a syrup, it sets the frosting's sweetness and body as it cools and thickens.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and richness, making the cooked mixture creamy rather than brittle.
The step that matters
Boil the sugar and cold water until it threads or hairs.. The sugar's concentration decides the final texture. Stopping too early leaves a runny syrup that will not stiffen, while boiling too long makes the frosting hard and grainy.
“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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