Name: Original Nut Cake
Ingredients: ½ cup sugar; ½ cup butter; ½ cup milk; 1 teaspoon vanilla extract; 3 drops almond extract; 1¼ cups all-purpose flour; 1 teaspoon baking powder; 2 large egg whites; 1 cup chopped walnuts

Why it works: Almond and walnut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 993 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Original Nut Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

Cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the milk, vanilla, almond extract, flour, and baking powder.
Beat in the egg whites until smooth.

Bake

Spread the batter in a shallow pan and top with chopped walnuts.
Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) until done.

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.

Almond + walnuttop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together993 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Vanilla + almondtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,961 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,673 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,187 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter: Creams with sugar to trap air and add richness and tenderness to the crumb.
All-purpose flour: Provides the structure that sets the cake as the batter bakes.
Egg whites: Add structure and help bind the batter as it sets in the oven.
Baking powder: Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
Walnuts: Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor to the top of the cake.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, vanilla, almond, flour, egg):

Chestnutfits better
Pistachiofits better
Hazelnutfits better
Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, vanilla, almond, flour, egg. 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.