Name: Emergency Biscuit
Ingredients: baking powder biscuit recipe; more milk; butter for greasing; milk for brushing

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Emergency Biscuit

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

baking powder biscuit recipe
more milk
butter for greasing
milk for brushing

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the baking powder biscuit recipe, adding more milk until the mixture can be dropped from a spoon without spreading.
Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto a buttered baking sheet, placing them ½ inch apart.
Brush the tops with milk.
Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for 8 minutes.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Biscuit + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,009 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Biscuit + milktop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,332 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).