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Dessert

Rock Cookies

A sweet cookie mixture of butter, sugar, flour, walnuts, raisins, cinnamon, soda, and salt baked into small cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By United Methodist Church (Grayville, Ill.) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 32 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Rock Cookies

Ingredients

Directions

Make the first dough

  1. Combine one and one-half cups light brown sugar, one cup melted butter, three eggs (well beaten separately), one teaspoon cinnamon, one teaspoon soda dissolved in hot water, one pinch salt, two and one-half cups flour, one pound chopped English walnuts, and three-fourths pound chopped raisins.

  2. Drop spoonfuls onto a well-buttered pan and bake slowly.

Make the second dough

  1. Combine one cup sour cream, two cups brown sugar, one cup chopped raisins, two-thirds cup butter, two beaten eggs, one teaspoon soda, one teaspoon cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg.

  2. Stir in flour until dough is as stiff as can be.

  3. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto a well-buttered pan, leaving plenty of room for them to spread.

  4. Beat three eggs well.

Make the remaining batches

  1. Combine one cup butter, one and one-half cups brown sugar, three-quarters pound raisins, one quarter pound English walnuts (in fine pieces), two cups flour, and one teaspoon soda dissolved in hot water.

  2. Drop teaspoonfuls onto a buttered pan and bake slowly.

  3. Combine one and one-half cups sugar, one cup butter, one and one-half cups raisins (chopped fine), three and one-half cups flour, one teaspoon cinnamon, one teaspoon soda dissolved in little hot water, two tablespoons sweet milk, and one pound walnuts (chopped).

  4. Turn pan bottom side up, drop spoonfuls and bake.

  5. Grease pans.

  6. Combine scant cup butter, one and one-half cups sugar, three eggs (not separated), one and one-half cups raisins, one-half pound nuts, three cups flour, one-half teaspoon cinnamon, and one-half teaspoon soda dissolved in two tablespoons water.

  7. Drop spoonfuls onto pan and bake until a rich brown.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

1027Calories
46 gProtein
30 gFat
145 gCarbs

Counts 10 of 11 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 10 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Yogurt170g plain Greek100
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Grape1/2 cup (76g)62
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Walnut1 walnut half (4g)26
Cinnamon1 tsp ground (2.6g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By United Methodist Church (Grayville, Ill.). Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

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.

  1. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Cinnamon + walnuttop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Walnut + nutstop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together284 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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 cookie together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the cookies spread in the pan.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and moisture to the cookies.
Brown sugar
Adds moisture and chewiness, and drives browning during baking.
Soda
Reacts with acidic ingredients to help the cookies rise and spread.
Walnuts
Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft dough.

The step that matters

Bake until a rich brown. Sugars and proteins brown through the Maillard reaction, which gives flavor and color. Baking past rich brown dries the cookies and makes them hard.

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, cinnamon, flour, walnut, raisin, cream):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, cinnamon, flour, walnut, raisin, cream. 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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