Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Tea Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the dough
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, beat 6 eggs, omitting the whites of 4.
Add ½ pound of loaf sugar and ¾ pound of butter, mixing until smooth.
Dissolve 1 teaspoon of baking soda in 1 tablespoon of vinegar and add to the mixture.
Flavor the dough to your taste.
Shape and bake
Make a soft dough, roll it thin, and cut into shapes.
Bake quickly until delicately golden.
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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Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,806 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,513 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Provide structure and richness, binding the dough and adding moisture.
- Butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and a rich, short texture in the baked cakes.
- Loaf sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown lightly in the oven.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the vinegar to produce gas that lightens the dough.
- Vinegar
- Acidifies the dough so the baking soda can react and leaven it.
The step that matters
Bake quickly until delicately golden. A hot oven sets the outside before the cakes dry out. Baking too long dries and darkens them, so watch for a pale golden colour and remove them 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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