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Dessert

Sweet Cakes

A sweet cake made with sugar, eggs, sour cream, butter, baking soda, flour, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter 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 ↓

Sweet Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, eggs, sour cream, and butter until well combined.

  3. Add the baking soda and mix thoroughly.

  4. Gradually add enough flour to form a dough that can be rolled out.

  5. Flavor the dough with nutmeg.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and cut into desired shapes.

  2. Bake in the preheated oven until golden.

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.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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
Adds fat and richness, which contributes to a tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown as they bake.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and richness.
Sour cream
Adds moisture and acidity to the dough.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidity of the sour cream to help the cakes rise.
Flour
Provides the structure that lets the dough be rolled and cut.

The step that matters

Add the baking soda and mix thoroughly. Baking soda needs to be evenly distributed through the dough so it reacts with the sour cream's acidity. Uneven mixing leaves pockets that may brown unevenly or rise unevenly.

“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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