Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Cherry 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.
Stir in the milk, preserved cherries, and sultanas.
In another bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, and essence.
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, mixing until just combined.
Pour the batter into a shallow cake tin.
Bake
Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
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 + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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
- Eggs
- Add structure and richness, and help bind the batter together.
- Butter
- Adds fat and tenderness, and carries flavor through the crumb.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the cake once it sets in the oven.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidifies the batter, helping the leavening react and stabilizing the texture.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake, tenderizes the crumb, and helps the butter cream to a light texture.
The step that matters
Creaming the butter and sugar. Beating butter and sugar until light and fluffy traps air that helps the cake rise. Under-creaming leaves a dense cake, while adding eggs too quickly can cause the batter to split.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, flour, milk, cream, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Coconutfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, flour, milk, cream, sugar. 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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