Skip to main content
Dessert

Marie Paidar

A lemon cream cake made with butter, flour, eggs, cream, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Paidar, Marie, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Marie Paidar

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Cream one-half cup butter with six tablespoons powdered sugar.

  2. Add a pinch of salt and grated rind of one lemon.

  3. Add the beaten yolks of three eggs and white of one egg.

  4. Add one bottle cream.

  5. Add one-half pound flour sifted six times with two level tablespoons baking powder.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out about one-half inch thick.

  2. Cut with small round cutter.

  3. Place any desired filling in center.

  4. Bake in moderate oven.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

698Calories
20 gProtein
24 gFat
100 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

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

By Paidar, Marie, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp. 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 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
Creams with sugar to give the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Eggs
Add richness and structure, with the yolks contributing to tenderness and set.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the dough.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and stays light.

The step that matters

Add the flour with baking powder. Overmixing once flour is added develops gluten, which can make the cake tough. Mix only until the flour is just combined so the texture stays tender and light.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, egg, 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.

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipesLemon CustardLemon Custard64 recipes