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 ↓
Cocoa-nut 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.
Make the batter
Combine 1 cup moist sugar and 1 tablespoon butter in a bowl.
Beat them together until well mixed.
Add the egg white and the yolks of 2 eggs.
Mix in 1 cup milk and 2 teaspoons baking powder.
Gradually add flour until a thick batter forms.
Divide the batter into 3 layers.
Bake and frost
Bake in a 7-inch round cake tin at 350°F (175°C).
Once baked, turn out each layer.
Cover each layer with frosting made by frothing the egg white.
Mix in 2 tablespoons sugar.
Add desiccated cocoa-nut to taste.
Stack the layers on top of each other as you frost 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.
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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + cocoatop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together643 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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
- Moist sugar
- Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps give the cake a soft, tender crumb.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and fat, and help bind the batter for a tender texture.
- Egg white
- Whipped into the frosting, it traps air to create a light, foamy topping.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas when heated, causing the batter to rise and become light.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that sets the batter as it bakes.
The step that matters
Frothing the egg white for the frosting. Egg white must be beaten until foamy so it traps air and holds its shape. Under-whipped frosting stays runny and slides off the layers, while over-whipping can make it dry and grainy.
Swap the cocoa
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, milk, flour):
- Almondfits better
- Chestnutfits better
- Milletfits better
- Cocoathe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, milk, flour. 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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