Name: A Good Short Cake Crust
Ingredients: 2 cups flour; ½ teaspoon salt; 2 teaspoons baking powder; 2 tablespoons shortening; 1 tablespoon sugar; 1 egg; milk (enough to fill a coffee cup after beating the egg)

Why it works: Milk and coffee are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,202 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

A Good Short Cake Crust

Ingredients

Directions

In a mixing bowl, combine flour, salt, baking powder, and sugar.
Rub the shortening through the flour mixture.
Beat the egg in a coffee cup and fill the cup with milk.
Mix the dry ingredients with the egg and milk until combined.

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.

Milk + coffeetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,202 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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).
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + coffeetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,344 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

Green Corn Pudding64 recipes

Cornmeal mush12 recipes

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A Good Short Cake Crust