Name: Soda and Cream of Tartar Biscuit
Ingredients: 1 quart of flour; 1 teaspoon of baking soda; 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar; 1 teaspoon of salt; 2 tablespoons of lard or butter (melted); Milk (as needed)

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 ↓

Soda and Cream of Tartar Biscuit

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

In a bowl, combine the baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt, and mix the mixture well with a knife.
Add the mixture to the flour and sift together three times for even distribution.
Mix in the melted butter evenly, breaking any lumps with your hands.

Shape and bake

Gradually add milk until the dough is consistent but not sticky.
Roll out the dough to about ½ inch thick and cut with a 2-inch cutter.
Prick the tops of the biscuits with a fork and bake at 400°F (200°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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

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

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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: Forms the structure of the biscuits as the main body of the dough.
Baking soda: Reacts with the cream of tartar to produce gas that makes the biscuits rise.
Cream of tartar: Provides acid that reacts with the baking soda to leaven the dough.
Lard or butter: Adds fat that tenderises the crumb and gives a rich flavour.
Milk: Hydrates the flour so the dough holds together and bakes through.

The step that matters

Adding the milk gradually. Too much liquid makes the dough sticky and tough, because wet mixing develops gluten. Adding milk a little at a time lets you stop once the dough is just consistent, keeping the biscuits tender.

“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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Soda and Cream of Tartar Biscuit