Name: Honey Muffins
Ingredients: 3 cups flour; 2 tablespoons butter; ½ teaspoon salt; 3 eggs; 3 teaspoons baking powder; ½ cup milk; 1 cup strained honey

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 ↓

Honey Muffins

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder.
Rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

Make and bake

Add the beaten eggs, milk, and honey, and mix until smooth.
Pour the batter into greased muffin tins.
Bake until golden brown.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Milk + honeytop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,336 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + honeytop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,327 recipes

Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 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

Flour: Provides the structure that holds the muffins together as they bake.
Eggs: Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the crumb.
Baking powder: Releases gas in the oven, making the muffins rise and turn light.
Butter: Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.
Honey: Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the muffins brown.
Milk: Adds moisture and liquid that hydrates the flour into a batter.

“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.