Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Rice 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.
Prepare
Beat the butter until creamy.
Whisk the egg whites until stiff.
Add the egg whites to the butter.
Stir in the flour, ground rice, and flavoring.
Beat the mixture well for 15 to 20 minutes.
Add the egg yolks and beat again for a few minutes.
Bake
Line a baking tin with buttered paper.
Pour in the mixture and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 1 to 1.5 hours.
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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Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,673 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Rice + almondtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,456 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,245 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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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).
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
- Eggs
- Whites trap air for lift, and yolks add richness and structure as the cake sets.
- Butter
- Creamed with sugar, it carries air and adds richness and a tender crumb.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
- Ground rice
- Gives a finer, more delicate crumb than flour alone.
- Castor sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps hold air when beaten into the butter.
The step that matters
Folding in the whisked egg whites. Stiff whites hold the air that makes the cake rise. Beating them too long makes them grainy and dry, and deflating them while stirring in the flour loses that lift.
“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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