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 ↓
Carolina 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cream together the sugar and butter until smooth.
Dissolve the baking soda in the milk and add it to the mixture.
Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Mix the cream of tartar into the flour before adding.
Make the batter
Gradually add the whipped egg whites and flour to the mixture, alternating between the two.
If desired, fold in the grated coconut.
Bake
Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
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 + coconuttop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,648 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Butter + coconuttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,467 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg whites
- Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air and give the cake its light, airy structure.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Butter
- Creamed with sugar, it adds fat that gives the cake tenderness and richness.
- Sugar
- Creamed with butter, it sweetens the cake and helps give it a tender crumb.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidity in the batter to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Stabilizes the whipped egg whites so they hold their peaks longer.
The step that matters
Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Underwhipped whites will not hold enough air to lighten the batter, while overwhipped whites turn dry and grainy and collapse easily. Folding them in gently keeps the trapped air in the batter.
Swap the coconut
The recipe marks coconut as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, flour, milk, egg, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Coconutthe original
- Figfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, flour, milk, egg, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“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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