Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓
Orange Cake
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the flavourings
Zest the orange thinly.
Soak the zest in the lemon juice for at least one hour.
Strain the lemon juice.
Make the batter
Cream the butter and sugar together.
Add the egg yolks one at a time, beating for ten minutes.
Add the strained lemon juice to the mixture.
Stir in the flour until well combined.
Dissolve the baking soda in hot water and mix it into the batter.
Pour the batter into a flat cake pan.
Bake and ice
Bake until done.
Soak the lemon zest in orange juice for one hour.
Strain the lemon zest.
Mix the strained juice with icing sugar until thick and smooth.
Spread the icing over the cake when it is slightly cool.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together10,634 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Flour and butter 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
- Provides the structure that holds the cake up as it bakes.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and help bind the batter into a smooth, stable mixture.
- Butter
- Adds fat for a tender crumb and a rich flavour.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic juice to produce gas that makes the cake rise.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps keep the crumb tender.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and activates the baking soda.
The step that matters
Add the egg yolks one at a time, beating for ten minutes. Adding yolks gradually lets each one emulsify fully into the creamed butter and sugar. Adding them all at once can cause the mixture to curdle and bake up uneven.
Swap the orange
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, egg, sugar, butter, lemon):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Orangethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, egg, sugar, butter, lemon. 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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