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Baking

Corn-starch Cake

A sweet cake made with corn starch, flour, butter, sugar, eggs, milk, baking soda, and cream of tartar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Corn-starch Cake

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 the batter

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

  2. Sift together the baking soda, cream of tartar, corn starch, and flour.

  3. In a separate bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

  4. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  5. Stir in the sweet milk and the sifted dry ingredients.

  6. Flavor the batter with vanilla or lemon extract.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  5. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Corn starch
Lightens the crumb and gives a tender, fine texture because it contains no gluten.
All-purpose flour
Provides structure as the gluten-forming flour that holds the cake together.
Eggs
Add structure and richness as they set during baking and bind the batter.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and creaming with sugar traps air for lift.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, fluffy texture when creamed with butter.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter and works with baking soda to help the cake rise.

The step that matters

Adding the eggs one at a time. Each egg must be fully mixed in before the next so the emulsion stays smooth and the batter keeps the air trapped by creaming. Adding them too fast can curdle the batter and give a coarser, denser cake.

“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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