Name: Strawberry Shortcake
Ingredients: 2 cups all-purpose flour; ½ teaspoon salt; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 1 cup sour milk; 1 pound strawberries; ½ cup sugar

Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Strawberry Shortcake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

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 and bake the crust

Make a short pie crust by mixing flour and salt, then roll out two thicknesses and sprinkle flour between them.
Bake the crust in a 400°F (200°C) oven until golden.

Prepare and assemble

While the cake bakes, wash and slice the strawberries, then sprinkle them with sugar.
Once the cake is done, split it open and spread the sugared strawberries over the bottom half.
Replace the top half of the cake.

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.

Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together77,875 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

All-purpose flour: Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour milk to release gas that makes the cake rise.
Sour milk: Its acidity activates the baking soda and tenderizes the crumb.
Cream of tartar: Adds acidity that supports the leavening reaction and stabilizes the rise.
Strawberries: Add moisture, fresh fruit flavor and color to the filling.
Sugar: Sweetens the strawberries and draws out their juice.

“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.