Name: Excellent Biscuit
Ingredients: 2 cups all-purpose flour; 2 tablespoons butter or ¼ cup lard; 1 teaspoon baking soda; sour milk (enough to make a very soft dough)

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 ↓

Excellent Biscuit

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons butter or ¼ cup lard
1 teaspoon baking soda
sour milk (enough to make a very soft dough)

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.

Mix the dough

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, mix the flour, butter or lard, and baking soda.
Add sour milk gradually to form a very soft dough.
Knead the dough gently, avoiding beating.

Bake

Place the biscuits in the warm oven and bake, gradually increasing the heat.

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).
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).

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

All-purpose flour: Provides the main structure that holds the biscuits together as they bake.
Butter or lard: Coats flour particles and shortens gluten strands, giving a tender, flaky texture.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour milk to release gas, helping the biscuits rise.
Sour milk: Adds moisture and acidity that activates the baking soda and softens the dough.

The step that matters

Knead the dough gently, avoiding beating.. Vigorous mixing or kneading develops gluten, which makes biscuits tough and dense instead of tender and light.

“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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Excellent Biscuit