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Baking

A Solimemne

A yeast-leavened sweet cake made from flour, egg yolks, butter and sugar, baked in a buttered mold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 41,494 recipes mention both. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

The recipe

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the leaven

  1. For the leaven, mix 3 ounces of flour with yeast and warm cream or milk to form a paste.

  2. Cover and let rise near heat for 30 minutes.

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, make a hollow in the remaining flour.

  2. Add salt, sugar, egg yolks, butter, and warm cream, and mix until smooth.

  3. Flatten the mixture on a surface.

  4. Spread the leaven over it.

  5. Knead lightly until well combined.

Bake and finish

  1. Place the dough in a well-buttered cake mold and let it rise in a warm place until doubled in size.

  2. Brush the top with beaten egg.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 30 minutes, until lightly colored.

  4. Remove from the mold and cut once or twice.

  5. Pour melted butter over it.

  6. Reassemble and serve immediately.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Cream + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Cream + sugartop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together43,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Flour + buttertop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together122,858 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together118,511 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Flour + eggtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together104,138 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 122,858 recipes mention both: they likely 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 gluten network that gives the dough its structure.
Yeast
Ferments the sugars in the leaven and dough, producing gas that makes the dough rise.
Egg yolks
Add richness and fat, tenderizing the crumb and helping the crust color.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the crumb tender and rich.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning in the crust.

The step that matters

Let the dough rise in the mold until doubled. Yeast gas expands the gluten structure; under-proofed dough bakes dense, while over-proofed dough can collapse and lose its shape in the oven.

“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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