Name: Watek Cookies
Ingredients: 1 cup sugar; ½ cup butter; ½ cup water; caraway seeds; additional sugar for sprinkling

Why it works: Sugar and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98,233 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Watek Cookies

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.

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the water and mix until combined.
Stir in caraway seeds to taste.
Roll the dough very thin using a rolling pin.
Cut into desired shapes and place on baking tins.
Sprinkle with additional sugar before baking.
Bake until lightly golden.

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.

Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sugar + carawaytop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,409 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Butter + carawaytop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,273 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).