Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓
Breakfast Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Mix the milk and flour until smooth.
Add the eggs and melted butter, then mix well.
Combine the cream of tartar and baking soda.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture and stir until combined.
Cook the cakes
Heat a griddle or frying pan and grease with butter.
Pour batter onto the griddle to form cakes.
Cook until golden brown on both sides.
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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Milk + buttertop 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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Flour + buttertop 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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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
- Provides the structure that holds the batter together as the cakes set.
- Eggs
- Add structure and richness, helping the cakes hold their shape.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidic powder that reacts with baking soda to produce gas for rising.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic cream of tartar to release gas that lightens the cakes.
- Milk
- Hydrates the flour and adds moisture and tenderness to the batter.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and helps the cakes brown in the pan.
The step that matters
Combine the dry ingredients into the wet mixture gently. Stirring only until combined keeps gluten development low, so the cakes stay tender. Overmixing makes them tough, and the leavening gas is released quickly once the acid and base meet, so the batter should go onto the griddle promptly.
“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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