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 ↓
Layer Cake
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Cream the butter and sugar together.
Add the milk and eggs, mixing well.
In a separate bowl, combine the flour and baking powder.
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, stirring until smooth.
Make the filling
For the filling, boil the grated apple, lemon juice, and sugar together for five minutes to make a jelly.
Assemble the cake
Bake the cake in layers and spread the jelly between the layers.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + appletop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,104 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Lemon + appletop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,551 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 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
- Butter
- Creams with sugar to trap air, giving the cake a tender, rich crumb.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps create a light texture when creamed with butter.
- Eggs
- Add structure and richness, helping the batter set as it bakes.
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the cake as it sets in the oven.
- Strong's baking powder
- Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
- Sour apple
- Adds acidity and moisture to the jelly filling, balancing its sweetness.
The step that matters
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture. Adding flour in portions and stirring just until smooth keeps the batter even and limits gluten development, which prevents a tough cake.
Swap the apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, milk, flour, lemon):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Applethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, milk, flour, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“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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