Name: Curraitt Biscuits
Ingredients: 1 pound sugar; 1 pound butter; 1½ pounds all-purpose flour; 4 eggs; 1 teaspoon cinnamon; 1 teaspoon nutmeg; 1 pound currants

Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Curraitt Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

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.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the dough

Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy.
Whisk the eggs and add them to the butter and sugar mixture along with the cinnamon, nutmeg, and currants.
Roll the dough out into sheets and cut it into cakes.

Bake

Place the cakes on baking sheets and sift white sugar over the top.
Bake in the preheated oven until golden.

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.

Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,917 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,623 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,341 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together30,779 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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: Creams with sugar to add richness and a tender crumb.
All-purpose flour: Provides the structure that holds the dough together when cut into cakes.
Eggs: Bind the dough and add moisture and richness.
Sugar: Sweetens the biscuits and helps them brown in the oven.
Currants: Add fruity sweetness and chewy bits throughout the dough.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, flour, egg, cinnamon, nutmeg):

Raisinfits better
Vanillafits better
Figfits better
Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, flour, egg, cinnamon, nutmeg. 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.