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 ↓
Caramel 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.
Make the cake batter
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the flour, sweet milk, egg whites, and baking powder; mix well.
Pour the batter into deep jelly pans and bake until golden.
Make the caramel
For the caramel, combine 2 cups of granulated sugar, 1 cup of cream, and 1 tablespoon of butter in a saucepan.
Boil for 15 minutes, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat and stir until it begins to thicken.
Assemble and frost
Spread the caramel between the cake layers and frost the top and sides with a thick layer of caramel.
For chocolate caramel, boil for 10 minutes and add 4 sticks of grated chocolate.
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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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 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
- Flour
- Forms the structure that holds the cake's shape as it bakes.
- Eggs
- Egg whites add structure and help the batter bake up light.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes tender.
- Butter
- Adds richness and tenderness to the cake crumb.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps it brown as it bakes.
- Cream
- Adds fat and body to the caramel, making it smooth and rich.
The step that matters
Boiling the caramel while stirring. Sugar boiled in cream can scorch or crystallize if left unattended or stirred inconsistently. Constant stirring keeps heat even so the sugar dissolves and the caramel cooks smoothly before thickening off the heat.
“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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