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 ↓
Silver 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 the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.
Add the egg whites and lemon juice, mixing well.
In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar.
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture, alternating with the sweet milk.
Bake and serve
Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.
Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Let cool and frost with white frosting.
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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Butter + flourtop 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).
Butter and flour 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
- Butter
- Creams with sugar to trap air, giving the cake a light, tender crumb and rich flavor.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps hold air when creamed with butter, aiding a light texture.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that sets the cake's crumb as the batter bakes.
- Egg whites
- Add structure and lift, helping the cake rise and set as it bakes.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas, helping the cake rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidic ingredient that reacts with baking soda to leaven the batter and stabilizes the egg whites.
The step that matters
Alternating dry ingredients with sweet milk. Adding the dry ingredients gradually and alternating with milk keeps the batter smooth and well emulsified. Dumping everything in at once can overmix the flour, developing gluten and making the cake tough.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, flour, milk, cream, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Coconutfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, flour, milk, cream, 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.
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