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Dessert

Strawberry Shortcake

A shortcake made with flour, butter, milk, and strawberries, topped with a sugared berry sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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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 ↓

Strawberry Shortcake

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the shortcake

  1. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.

  2. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

  3. Stir in milk until just combined.

  4. Spread mixture in a jelly-cake pan and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 15-20 minutes.

Prepare the berries

  1. While baking, rinse strawberries and cover with sugar; let sit in a cool place for 1 hour.

Assemble and make the sauce

  1. Once shortcake is done, spread liberally with butter.

  2. Top with mashed berries and the sugared strawberries.

  3. For the sauce, boil milk, then pour over beaten egg yolk mixed with sugar and salt.

  4. Stir constantly over a boiling kettle for 2 minutes.

  5. Serve sauce hot or cold, optionally adding frothed egg white.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 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. Flour + milktop 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).

Flour and butter 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the shortcake as its starch and gluten set in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the shortcake rises and turns light.
Butter
Cut into the flour to make the shortcake tender and crumbly, and adds richness.
Strawberries
Provide fruity flavour and juice that soaks into the shortcake when sugared.
Sugar
Sweetens the berries and draws out their juice, and sweetens the sauce.
Egg yolk
Thickens the sauce as its proteins set when heated with the milk.

The step that matters

Stirring the sauce over heat. The egg yolk can scramble if the sauce is left unstirred or overheated. Constant stirring keeps the heat even so the mixture thickens smoothly into a custard-like sauce.

“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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