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 ↓
Nut 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.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, mix sugar, butter, milk, flour, and baking powder until combined.
Chop the walnuts, reserving 25 perfect halves for decoration.
Stir the chopped walnuts into the batter just before adding the beaten egg whites.
Gently fold in the egg whites last.
Bake and finish
Pour the batter into a loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes.
Frost the top with plain frosting and place the reserved walnut halves on top, pressing them into the 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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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 + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + walnuttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,873 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 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).
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
- Flour
- Builds the cake's structure as its proteins set during baking.
- Egg whites
- Trap air and add lift, giving the cake a lighter, more open crumb.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, causing the cake to rise in the oven.
- Butter
- Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and carries flavour.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps keep it moist and tender.
- Milk
- Hydrates the flour and adds moisture to the batter.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Beaten egg whites hold the air that lifts the cake. Stirring them in vigorously or for too long knocks out that air, which leads to a dense, heavy cake. Fold gently, just until no white streaks remain.
Swap the walnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, flour, egg):
- Almondfits better
- Chestnutfits about as well
- Milletfits about as well
- Walnutthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, 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.
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