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 ↓
Sour Cream Cookies
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the dough
Cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy.
Add the sour cream, nutmeg, and eggs, mixing well.
Stir in the baking powder and baking soda.
Gradually add flour until a soft dough forms.
Bake
Drop spoonfuls of dough onto the bottoms of baking tins.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,920 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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
- Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the cookies tenderness and richness.
- Sour cream
- Adds moisture and acidity that keeps the cookies soft and tender.
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and add structure and richness.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the sour cream's acidity to produce gas that lifts the cookies.
- Baking powder
- Provides additional lift and helps the cookies rise in the oven.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the dough once it is mixed in.
The step that matters
Gradually add flour until a soft dough forms. Overmixing once flour is added develops gluten, which makes cookies tough. Adding flour gradually and stopping when the dough is soft keeps the texture tender.
“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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