Name: Squirt Biscuits
Ingredients: 6 ounces butter; ¾ pound flour; 6 ounces sugar; 3 eggs

Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Squirt Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

6 ounces butter
¾ pound flour
6 ounces sugar
3 eggs

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

Make and shape the dough

Rub the butter into the flour and sugar until well combined.
Moisten the mixture with the eggs to form a dough.
Use a biscuit squirt to shape the biscuits.

Bake

Bake in the preheated oven until lightly golden, about 10 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.

Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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, it coats flour particles and adds richness and tenderness to the biscuits.
Flour: Forms the main structure of the dough once combined with the eggs.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the biscuits brown lightly in the oven.
Eggs: Moisten the mixture and bind it into a dough, adding structure as they set.

“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.