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Dessert

Rice Sandwiches

Rice Sandwiches are baked rice cakes spread with strawberry jam and sprinkled with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Rice Sandwiches

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

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

Make and bake the base

  1. In a bowl, mix the ground rice, flour, butter, castor sugar, baking powder, and egg for five minutes.

  2. Spread the mixture thinly onto a well-buttered baking tin.

  3. Bake for five minutes, then turn out onto sugared paper.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spread half with strawberry jam and press the other half lightly on top.

  2. Cut into pieces like sandwiches, arrange neatly, and sprinkle with sugar.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Rice + flourtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,611 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

Ground rice
Gives the base a fine, slightly crumbly and tender texture.
Flour
Provides structure so the thin base holds together when cut.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb, and helps the base release from the tin.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the base and helps it brown lightly in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the thin base rises slightly and stays light.
Egg
Binds the mixture and adds moisture and structure to the base.

The step that matters

Spreading the mixture thinly in the tin. A thin, even layer bakes quickly and evenly in a short time, so it stays tender and does not dry out or brown unevenly. A thick layer would need longer and could turn dense in the centre.

Swap the strawberry jam

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, flour, butter, sugar, egg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Strawberry jamthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, flour, butter, sugar, egg. 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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