Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Rice Cake, a Sweet Dish
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 the rice
Wash and drain the rice.
Boil the rice with cream and lemon peel until nearly cold.
Remove the lemon peel and add the rice to the saucepan.
Cook over low heat until the rice swells.
Add salt and sweeten with sugar.
When tender, mix in the egg yolks and gradually fold in the beaten egg whites.
Bake and serve
Clarify the butter and coat a mold with it.
Sprinkle grated bread inside the mold and brush with clarified butter.
Add more grated bread, pour in the rice mixture, and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 1 hour.
Turn out onto a dish and serve with preserved raspberries, cherries, or currants.
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 + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Rice + lemontop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,366 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Rice + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,259 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Rice
- Forms the bulk of the dish, swelling in cream to give a soft, set body.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the custard-like mixture and help it set when baked.
- Egg whites
- Folded in beaten, they add lightness and help the cake rise and hold its shape.
- Fresh cream
- Cooks with the rice to make it rich and moist, giving a tender texture.
- Fresh butter
- Clarified and brushed on the mold, it adds richness and helps the crumbs brown and release.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Beaten whites hold air that lightens the mixture; deflating them by overmixing or folding too roughly makes the cake dense and flat after baking.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, cream, sugar, egg, butter, bread):
- Vanillafits better
- Coconutfits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rice, cream, sugar, egg, butter, bread. 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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