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Dessert

Sally Lunn Cake

A yeast‑leavened cake made with flour, salt, sugar, milk, eggs, butter, soda, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Colbrath, M. Tarbox · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sally Lunn Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dough

  1. Mix the salt with the flour.

  2. Add the yeast dissolved in three tablespoons of warm water, and gradually add the milk.

  3. Beat the yolks of the eggs, then the whites, then both together with the sugar, and stir into the batter.

  4. Beat the mixture until smooth.

  5. Set the dough to rise overnight.

Rise and mix

  1. In the morning, when the dough has risen, cream a piece of butter the size of a large egg and dissolve half a teaspoon of soda in very little warm water.

  2. Mingle the butter and soda mixture with the dough.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter baking pans to a depth of two inches and pour the dough into them.

  2. Let the dough rise until the pans are doubled in size.

  3. Bake for half an hour.

  4. Serve the cake broken, not cut with a knife.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

884Calories
28 gProtein
31 gFat
121 gCarbs

Counts 7 of 8 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 7 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
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 Colbrath, M. Tarbox. 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the risen cake together.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Eggs
Add structure, richness and help set the crumb as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat, which softens the crumb and gives a tender texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps form a soft, pliable dough.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until the pans are doubled in size. Yeast gas expands the dough, and judging the rise by size rather than time gives a light crumb. Under-proofed dough stays dense, while over-proofed dough may collapse in the oven.

“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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