Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Ground Rice Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Cream the butter in a bowl.
Add the beaten eggs and sugar, stirring until smooth.
Mix the ground rice, flour, and baking powder together on a plate.
Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and stir until smooth.
Bake
Pour the batter into a drop cake tin.
Bake for about 20 minutes.
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 + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 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).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + ricetop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,645 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Rice + flourtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,611 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
- Butter
- Adds richness and tenderness, and carries flavour through the batter.
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the oven.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cakes and helps them brown as they bake.
- Ground rice
- Gives a fine, slightly crumbly texture that differs from wheat flour.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cakes together.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas during baking so the cakes rise and become light.
The step that matters
Stir the dry mixture into the wet until smooth. Overmixing once the flour is added develops gluten and can make the cakes tough. Stir just until the batter is smooth, then bake promptly so the baking powder's rising power is not lost.
“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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