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Dessert

Steamed Snow Balls

A sweet steamed dumpling made from flour, sugar, eggs, milk, and flavoring.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Steamed Snow Balls

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. In a separate bowl, beat the yolks until creamy and blend with the milk.

  3. Fold the beaten egg whites into the yolk mixture.

  4. Combine the flour, sugar and baking powder, then add them to the egg mixture.

  5. Stir in the flavoring.

Steam and serve

  1. Drop 1 tablespoon of dough into each buttered steamer cup.

  2. Place the cups in a steamer and steam for 20 minutes.

  3. Serve with whipped cream.

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. Milk + buttertop 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. Sugar + flourtop 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

Eggs
Beaten whites trap air, giving the snow balls a light, airy structure.
Flour
Provides the starch structure that sets the dough as it steams.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps keep the texture tender.
Baking powder
Releases gas during steaming, helping the balls rise and lighten.
Milk
Adds moisture and blends with the yolks to make a smooth batter.

The step that matters

Fold the beaten egg whites into the yolk mixture. Folding gently keeps the air beaten into the whites. Stirring or deflating them makes the snow balls dense instead of light.

“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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