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Dessert

Strawberry Short Cake

A layered cake made with flour, butter, baking powder, milk, and fresh strawberries, topped with mashed strawberries and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Strawberry Short Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Sift baking powder through the flour, then rub in the butter.

  3. Stir in enough sweet milk to mix into a dough.

  4. Turn the dough onto a floured surface, divide in half, and roll out each half to about ½ inch thick.

Bake and assemble

  1. Place one round in a greased round tin, spread with melted butter, and top with the second round.

  2. Bake for about 20 minutes.

  3. Once baked, separate the layers, spread both with butter, and heap mashed strawberries mixed with sugar on one layer.

  4. Place the other layer on top 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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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 + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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
Forms the structure of the dough once mixed with liquid.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the dough and flavour to the layers.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the dough so the shortcake rises and becomes light.
Sweet milk
Hydrates the flour so the dough holds together and bakes moist.
Fresh strawberries
Provide fruity flavour, moisture and sweetness on the layers.

The step that matters

Separate the layers after baking. The shortcake is baked as one piece, so it must be split while still warm and before the strawberries are added. Tipping it in only once cool can crack the layers, and it is essential to let the crumb absorb the butter and fruit juices evenly.

“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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