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 ↓
Whipped Cream Cake
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the batter
In a bowl, stir together the sugar and soft butter.
Add the well-beaten egg yolks and mix in the milk and flavoring.
Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.
Mix the cream of tartar and baking soda into the flour, then sift it into the batter and stir lightly.
Bake and finish
Pour the batter into a small dripping pan and bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden.
Once the cake is cool, whip the sweet cream until stiff and spread it over the cake.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour 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
- Egg whites add air and lift, while yolks add richness and help bind the batter.
- All-purpose flour
- Flour provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Sugar
- Sugar sweetens the cake and helps it brown as it bakes.
- Soft butter
- Butter adds fat for tenderness and flavor.
- Baking soda
- Baking soda, activated by the cream of tartar, produces gas that helps the cake rise.
- Sweet cream
- Whipped cream adds moisture and a light, creamy topping to the cooled cake.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Egg whites hold air that makes the cake light. Folding gently keeps that air in, while vigorous stirring deflates the batter and yields a denser 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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