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Dessert

Coffee Cake

A yeasted sweet loaf with butter, sugar, and cinnamon topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Coffee Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast in a little lukewarm water with 1 teaspoon of sugar.

  2. Combine the flour, lukewarm milk, and the yeast mixture. Let it rise.

  3. Add ¾ cup sugar, ½ cup lard and butter, salt, and lemon rind or nutmeg.

  4. Mix in enough flour to make a stiff dough. Let it rise again.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and place it in pans.

  2. Top with melted butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until 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.

  1. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its structure.
Compressed yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become light.
Lukewarm milk
Hydrates the flour and adds moisture and richness to the dough.
Lard and butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and carries flavor.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the baked crust.

The step that matters

Letting the dough rise. Yeast needs time and warmth to produce gas; rising too briefly leaves the cake dense, while over-proofing weakens the gluten structure so it collapses in the oven.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, milk, sugar, butter, cinnamon. 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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