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Snow Balls

Steamed small cakes served with strawberry sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Snow Balls

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Snow Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Cream butter and gradually add sugar.

  2. Mix in milk and sifted flour with baking powder.

  3. Fold in beaten egg whites until well combined.

Steam the puddings

  1. Butter cups and fill them half full with the mixture.

  2. Cover with wax paper and tie securely.

  3. Steam for 35 minutes.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. For the Fruit Hard Sauce, cream 2 tablespoons of butter.

  2. Add 1 cup confectioner's sugar and the unbeaten whites of 2 eggs, then beat thoroughly.

  3. Fold in 2 cups crushed fresh strawberries and serve immediately.

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.

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.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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 batter a tender, rich body.
Eggs
Beaten whites are folded in to lighten the batter and help it rise as it steams.
Flour
Forms the structure of the batter that holds the puddings together.
Baking powder
Releases gas during steaming so the puddings rise and stay light.
Strawberries
Add fruity flavour and moisture to the hard sauce.

The step that matters

Fold in beaten egg whites until well combined. Egg whites hold air from whisking, and that air gives the batter its lift. Folding gently keeps the foam intact; overmixing deflates it and the puddings turn dense.

“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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