Name: Layer Cake
Ingredients: 2 cups sugar; 2 cups flour; ½ cup sweet milk; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; ¼ teaspoon baking soda; 1 teaspoon lemon extract; 2 cups sugar (for filling); 1 cup sweet cream (for filling)

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Layer Cake

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.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, mix 2 cups sugar, 2 cups flour, ½ cup sweet milk, 1 teaspoon cream of tartar, ¼ teaspoon baking soda, and 1 teaspoon lemon extract until well combined.

Bake and fill

Pour the batter into prepared cake pans and bake until golden.
For the filling, boil 2 cups sugar and 1 cup sweet cream together for 20 minutes.
Once the cakes are cool, layer them with the filling.

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.

Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together30,404 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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 cake's crumb together as it bakes.
Sugar: Sweetens the cake and contributes to its golden browning in the oven.
Cream of tartar: Acidifies the batter and helps stabilize its texture along with the baking soda.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic ingredients to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Sweet cream: Provides richness and fat for the filling, giving it a soft, creamy texture.