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 ↓
Custard 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.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Beat the eggs separately in a bowl.
Make the cake
Combine the sugar, butter, cold water, flour, and baking powder with the beaten eggs.
Divide the batter into three layers and bake until golden.
Make the cream and assemble
In a saucepan, combine ½ cup sugar, ¾ cup milk, and corn-starch.
Boil the mixture until it thickens to a jelly‑like consistency, then flavor to taste.
Layer the baked cake with the cream.
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.
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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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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 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
- Provide structure and richness as they set in the batter.
- Flour
- Forms the main structure of the cake crumb once baked.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, helping the layers rise.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and a richer flavor in the cake.
- Corn-starch
- Thickens the milk mixture into a jelly-like cream when heated.
- Milk
- Supplies liquid that, with the starch, becomes the thickened cream.
The step that matters
Boiling the cream mixture until it thickens. Cornstarch only thickens once its granules are heated to a boil and swell in the liquid. Stopping early leaves a thin cream, while overcooking can break down the starch and make it runny again. Stir constantly to prevent scorching and lumps.
“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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