Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
Tea Cakes
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.
Make the dough
Beat the egg yolks and add the creamed butter and lard.
Mix in the sugar, cream of tartar, and baking soda dissolved in warm water.
Add lemon extract and the beaten egg whites.
Sift the ammonia into the flour and combine with the mixture.
Bake
Roll the dough thin and bake at 400°F (200°C).
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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Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together11,318 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,623 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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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).
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
- Eggs
- Yolks enrich the dough and whites add lift and a light texture.
- Butter
- Adds fat and richness, giving the cakes tenderness and flavour.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the dough and helps it brown in the oven.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the dough together as it bakes.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidifies the dough and helps the leavening react with the baking soda.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the dough to produce gas that makes it rise.
The step that matters
Roll the dough thin. A thin dough bakes through evenly and crisps, while thick dough can stay raw in the centre or spread unevenly. Rolling it to an even thickness helps the leavening give a consistent rise and texture.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, sugar, cream, flour, nutmeg):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, sugar, cream, flour, nutmeg. 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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