Name: Blueberry Breakfast Cake
Ingredients: ½ cup sugar; ⅓ cup butter; 1 cup blueberries, washed and dried; 3 cups flour, plus extra for dusting; 1 egg; 2 teaspoons baking powder; 1 cup milk; ¾ teaspoon coarse sea salt (formerly 'bay salt')

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 ↓

Blueberry Breakfast 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).

Make the batter

In a bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar.
Rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
Add the milk and stir until just combined.
Gently fold in the blueberries.
Pour the batter into a greased shallow pan.

Bake

Bake for about 30 minutes or until golden brown.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

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

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 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: Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Butter: Rubbed into the flour, it adds richness and tenderness to the crumb.
Baking powder: Releases gas as it heats, making the cake rise and become light.
Milk: Hydrates the flour and forms the batter, adding moisture to the cake.
Blueberries: Add moisture and fruity sweetness, bursting into juice as the cake bakes.
Egg: Binds the batter and adds structure and richness to the crumb.

The step that matters

Fold in the blueberries gently. Overmixing develops gluten in the flour, which toughens the cake. Gentle folding keeps the batter light and stops the blueberries from crushing and bleeding color through it.

“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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Blueberry Breakfast Cake