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Dessert

Ego Cracknels

A boiled and baked cookie made with sugar, baking powder, butter, eggs, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour 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 ↓

Ego Cracknels

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.

Make the dough

  1. Sift together sugar, baking powder, and flour.

  2. Rub in the butter and add the beaten eggs.

  3. Flour a surface, place the dough on it, and knead for a few minutes.

  4. Cover with a damp towel and let rest for 15 minutes.

Shape and boil

  1. Roll out the dough very thin, about ⅛ inch, and cut with a biscuit cutter.

  2. Boil water in a pot and prepare a bowl of cold water.

  3. Drop a few cut pieces into the boiling water.

  4. When they float and curl at the edges, remove with a skimmer and place in cold water.

  5. Once all are done, lay them on baking pans.

Bake

  1. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 15 minutes.

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 + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cookie brown lightly in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas that leavens the dough, giving it a lighter texture.
Butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the dough and gives a rich flavor.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and richness.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the dough together.

The step that matters

Boiling the cut pieces. Boiling until they float and curl, then chilling in cold water, sets the surface so the cookies keep their shape and texture during baking. Removing them too early leaves them soft and misshapen, while leaving them too long can make them tough.

“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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