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 ↓
Jelly 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, cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the sweet milk and eggs, mixing well.
Stir in the baking soda and cream of tartar.
Flavor the batter with lemon.
Bake and assemble
Pour the batter into cake pans and bake until golden.
Once cooled, spread jelly between the layers.
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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Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets in the oven.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that makes the cake rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Provides acidity that works with the baking soda to lighten the crumb.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and helps trap air when creamed with sugar.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender texture when creamed with butter.
- Sweet milk
- Adds moisture to the batter and helps it come together smoothly.
The step that matters
Stir in the baking soda and cream of tartar. Baking soda and cream of tartar react as soon as they are wet, so the batter should be baked promptly to keep the gas bubbles that make the cake rise.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, egg, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Strawberryfits better
- Coconutfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, egg, cream. 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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