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Dessert

Breakfast Cake

A sweet yeast cake made with milk, flour, eggs, sugar, butter, soda, cream tartar, nutmeg, and currants.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Women of the First Congregational Church (Marysville, Ohio) · 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 ↓

Breakfast Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break one egg into a cup and fill with sweet milk.

  2. Use the same cup for each measure.

  3. Add half cup yeast, half cup butter, one cup sugar, and enough flour to make a soft dough.

  4. Flavor with nutmeg.

Rise and shape

  1. Let it rise until very light.

  2. Mold into biscuits with a few currants.

  3. Let them rise a second time in the pan.

Bake and glaze

  1. Bake, and when nearly done, glaze with a little molasses and milk.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

896Calories
28 gProtein
32 gFat
122 gCarbs
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
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12

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

By Women of the First Congregational Church (Marysville, Ohio). 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. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the soft dough and its risen shape.
Yeast
Produces gas that makes the dough rise and become light.
Eggs
Add structure and richness to the soft dough.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the crumb and gives a tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and feeds the yeast while helping the crust brown.
Sweet milk
Moistens the dough so it comes together into a soft texture.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise until very light. Yeast gas expands the dough and creates its airy crumb. Rising too little leaves a dense cake, while rising too long can collapse the structure, so the dough should be checked by its lightness rather than by the clock.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Capersfits less well
  4. Jalapenofits less well

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