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Dessert

Whole Wheat Muffins

A quick baked muffin made with whole wheat flour, butter, lard, sugar, egg, sour milk, raisins, and leavening.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Whole Wheat Muffins

Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Whole Wheat Muffins

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 the batter

  1. Cream the butter and lard with the sugar.

  2. Add the unbeaten egg and cream again.

  3. Sift together the white flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder.

  4. Add the sifted mixture alternately with the sour milk to the creamed mixture.

  5. Beat hard for one minute, then fold in the raisins.

Bake

  1. Bake in greased and floured muffin tins.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 20 to 25 minutes.

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.

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.

  1. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

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

  4. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Butter and lard
Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the muffins a tender, rich crumb.
Sugar
Creaming with fat adds sweetness and helps the muffins brown.
Egg
Adds structure and richness, binding the batter as it sets in the oven.
Sour milk
Its acidity reacts with the baking soda to lift the batter and adds moisture.
Whole wheat flour
Provides structure and a nutty flavour, with more body than white flour.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the oven, helping the muffins rise and become light.

The step that matters

Add the sifted mixture alternately with the sour milk. Alternating dry and wet additions keeps the batter smooth and evenly emulsified. Adding it all at once or overmixing can cause lumps and a tougher, denser muffin.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, wheat):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinthe original
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk, flour, wheat. 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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