Name: Cake Trifle
Ingredients: sponge cake or rice cake; raspberry jam; 1 pint milk; 3 eggs; whipped cream

Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cake Trifle

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the sponge or rice cake into slices.
Place a third of the cake slices at the bottom of a dish.
Spread a layer of raspberry jam over the cake.
Add another layer of cake, followed by another layer of jam, and then another layer of cake.
Prepare thick custard by whisking together the milk and eggs, then pour it over the layered cake.
Top with a little whipped cream.

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.

Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,374 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Raspberry + milktop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,014 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Rice + raspberrytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together201 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
Raspberry + creamtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,332 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).