Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓
White Mountain 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.
Make the cake
Preheat your oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add the milk and mix well.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Sift together the flour and baking powder, then gradually add to the butter mixture.
Fold in the beaten egg whites gently until combined.
Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Make the icing
For the icing, dissolve the white sugar in cold water and boil until it ropes from the spoon.
Pour the hot syrup over the beaten egg whites and beat until stiff.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Egg whites
- Beaten to stiff peaks, they trap air and give the cake its light, airy structure.
- Butter
- Creamed with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich texture.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps it brown while creaming aerates the batter.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and tenderness to the batter.
The step that matters
Boiling the icing syrup. The syrup must reach the point where it ropes from the spoon; too little cooking leaves the icing runny, while pouring it over the whites while hot cooks and stiffens them into a marshmallow-like icing.
“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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