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Dessert

Farina Muffins

A quick muffin made with farina, flour, eggs, butter, milk, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Farina Muffins

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 batter

  1. Sift the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar together in a bowl.

  2. Work in the cold farina until well combined.

  3. Add the melted butter, milk, and egg yolks, mixing until smooth.

  4. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into greased gem pans.

  2. Bake for 20 minutes at 400°F (200°C).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

Farina
Adds a tender, slightly grainy crumb and body to the muffins.
Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the muffins together as they bake.
Eggs
Bind the batter and, with the whipped whites, add lift and structure.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the muffins rise in the oven.
Melted butter
Adds fat for richness and a moist, tender texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and hydrates the flour and farina for a smooth batter.

The step that matters

Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Egg whites hold air bubbles that give the muffins lift. Stirring or mixing vigorously at this point knocks out that air, leaving dense muffins, so the whites should be folded in lightly until just combined.

“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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