Name: Sour Milk Biscuits
Ingredients: 4 cups unsifted flour; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; 2 cups sour milk; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 2 tablespoons melted lard or butter

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Sour Milk Biscuits

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

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Sift together the flour and cream of tartar.

Make the dough

Stir the baking soda into the sour milk.
Mix the sour milk mixture with the flour mixture, add the melted lard or butter, and combine until just mixed.

Bake

Bake in the preheated oven.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Flour + buttertop 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).
Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

Flour: Builds the structure that holds the biscuits' shape as they bake.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acid in the sour milk and cream of tartar to release gas that lifts the biscuits.
Cream of tartar: Adds acidity that reacts with the baking soda to help the biscuits rise.
Sour milk: Supplies acidity that activates the baking soda and keeps the dough moist and tender.
Lard or butter: Coats the flour proteins to keep the biscuits tender and rich.

The step that matters

Combine until just mixed. Stirring the dough too much develops gluten, the flour's elastic protein network, which makes biscuits tough and dense instead of light and tender. Stop mixing as soon as the flour is moistened.

“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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Sour Milk Biscuits