Name: New Year's Cookies
Ingredients: 1 ¼ pounds sugar; 1 pound butter; ½ cup cold water; 3 ¼ pounds flour; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 4 tablespoons caraway seeds; 2 eggs

Why it works: Flour and caraway match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,435 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

New Year's Cookies

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.

Prepare the dough

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, rub or chop the butter into the flour.
Dissolve the sugar in the cold water.
Mix the dissolved sugar, flour mixture, baking soda, caraway seeds, and beaten eggs until well combined.

Shape and bake

Cut the dough with a round mold and place on a baking sheet.
Bake until golden brown.

Store

Store in a cool, dry place in a stone crock.

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.

Flour + carawaytop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,435 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Butter: Rubbed into the flour to add fat, tenderness and a crumbly texture.
Flour: Provides the main structure that holds the cookies together as they bake.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the cookies brown as they bake.
Eggs: Bind the dough and add richness and structure.
Baking soda: Reacts to lift the dough slightly and promote browning.
Caraway seeds: Contribute the distinctive aromatic, slightly peppery flavour.