Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Scotch Pancakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Mix the flour with a little cream.
Add the beaten yolks of the eggs.
Mix in the pint of cream.
Stir in the grated lemon peel, powdered sugar, and ratafia.
Beat the batter well.
Fold in the beaten egg whites.
Cook and serve
Heat a little butter or lard in a frying pan, wipe it out, and add more butter or lard.
Pour in a teacupful of batter when hot, and shake the pan.
Prick the pancake with a fork when firm, but do not turn it.
Hold it before the fire for a minute to brown.
Serve with powdered sugar sprinkled over them.
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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Cream + buttertop 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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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).
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
- Forms the structure that holds the pancake together as it sets.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and help bind the batter while it cooks.
- Cream
- Adds moisture and richness, keeping the pancake tender.
- Butter or lard
- Greases the pan and gives the pancake a golden, fried surface.
- Powdered sugar
- Adds sweetness and a light finish when sprinkled on top.
The step that matters
Leave the pancake alone until it is firm. Turning or pricking too early tears the thin, delicate batter before its proteins and starches have set, so the pancake breaks or becomes dense. Waiting until the surface looks firm lets it hold its shape.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, cream, egg, sugar, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Coconutfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, cream, egg, sugar, butter. 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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