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Dessert

Graham Gems

A simple cake made with Graham flour, all-purpose flour, milk, butter, sugar, baking powder, egg, and salt.

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

Graham Gems

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, beat the butter and sugar together until creamy.

  3. Add the egg and mix well.

  4. In another bowl, combine the Graham flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, and salt.

  5. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture, alternating with the milk. Mix until just combined.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.

  2. Bake for about 30 minutes or until golden brown.

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. Milk + buttertop 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. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Graham flour
Gives the cake its coarse, nutty texture and wheat flavor.
All-purpose flour
Provides structure so the cake holds its shape as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
Egg
Adds structure and binds the batter as it sets in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the crumb.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps form a smooth, pourable batter.

The step that matters

Mix until just combined. Once the dry ingredients meet the liquid, gluten begins to form. Overmixing toughens the cake and can make it dense, so stop as soon as no dry streaks remain.

“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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