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 ↓
Currant Cookies
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the dough
In a large bowl, cream together the brown sugar and butter.
Add the beaten eggs and sweet milk, mixing well.
Dissolve the baking soda in the milk and add to the mixture.
In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cream of tartar, and cinnamon.
Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture.
Fold in the currants.
Bake
Drop spoonfuls of dough onto a baking sheet.
Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,341 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Creamed with the sugar, it traps air and gives the cookies a tender, rich texture.
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and add moisture and structure as the cookies set.
- Flour
- Provides the main structure that holds the cookies together as they bake.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the acidic cream of tartar and moisture to lift the cookies as they bake.
- Brown sugar
- Adds sweetness, moisture and a caramel note, and helps the cookies brown.
- Currants
- Add tart, chewy bursts of fruit flavour throughout the cookies.
The step that matters
Dissolving the baking soda in the milk. Baking soda needs moisture to dissolve evenly and must meet an acid, here cream of tartar, to produce gas. Uneven dissolving can leave bitter or soapy patches and uneven rising.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, egg, milk, cream, cinnamon, flour):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Figfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, milk, cream, cinnamon, flour. 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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