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Dessert

Cinnamon, or Lemon Cakes

A small cake made from butter, flour, sugar, cinnamon, and eggs, baked at 300°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,341 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Cinnamon, or Lemon Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA very gentle oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very gentle oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat your oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Rub the butter into the flour until it resembles crumbs.

  3. Add the sugar and cinnamon, then mix to form a firm paste with the eggs.

  4. Roll out the dough to a thickness of about ¼ inch and cut into shapes.

Bake and store

  1. Bake in the preheated oven for 15 to 20 minutes, or until done.

  2. Once cooled, store the cakes in a clean, dry tin canister.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
Rubbed into the flour, it coats the flour and gives the cake a rich, tender crumb.
Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cakes together as they bake.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown in the oven.
Eggs
Bind the mixture into a firm paste and add structure to the dough.
Cinnamon
Adds warm aroma and flavour to the cakes.

The step that matters

Forming the firm paste. Mixing the sugar and cinnamon with the eggs must produce a firm, evenly combined paste. Uneven mixing leaves pockets of egg or spice, which affects texture and rolling.

Swap the cinnamon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, egg):

  1. Cinnamonthe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Jalapenofits less well
  4. Capersfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sugar, egg. 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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