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Dessert

Strawberry Shortcake

A baked cake made with pastry flour, butter, baking powder, salt, egg, milk, topped with strawberries, powdered sugar, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 dough

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

  2. In a bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, and salt.

  3. Cut in the butter until crumbly.

  4. Beat the egg and add enough milk to make a dough that can be rolled out.

  5. Roll the dough on a floured surface and place it in round buttered tins.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake until golden brown.

  2. Once baked, split the cake and cover with strawberries mixed with powdered sugar.

  3. Use a pastry bag to pipe whipped cream on top.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Pastry flour
Forms the structure of the cake as the starch and proteins set during baking.
Butter
Cut into the flour to create a crumbly, tender texture and richness.
Baking powder
Releases gas when heated, helping the cake rise and become light.
Egg
Adds structure, richness, and helps bind the dough together.
Strawberries
Add fresh fruit flavour and juiciness that soak into the cake.
Whipped cream
Adds moisture, richness, and a light, creamy topping.

The step that matters

Cut in the butter until crumbly. Butter must stay in small, cold pieces within the flour. As it melts in the oven it creates layers and a tender, flaky crumb rather than a dense, tough cake.

“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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