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 ↓
Walnut 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, cream together the powdered sugar and butter.
Add the milk and mix well.
Gradually stir in the flour, walnuts, baking soda, and cream of tartar.
Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.
Bake
Pour the batter into greased loaf pans.
Bake for about 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
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 + walnuttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,873 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
- Egg whites
- Beaten to a froth and folded in, they trap air that lifts the cake's crumb.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Butter
- Creamed with the sugar, it adds richness and a tender texture.
- Walnuts
- Add crunch and a nutty flavor throughout the cake.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidifies the batter and stabilizes the whipped egg whites for better lift.
The step that matters
Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Folding keeps the air bubbles in the whipped egg whites intact. Stirring vigorously would deflate them, leaving the cake denser and less risen.
Swap the walnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, milk, flour, meat, cream, egg):
- Almondfits better
- Walnutthe original
- Pistachiofits about as well
- Chestnutfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, milk, flour, meat, cream, egg. 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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