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Dessert

White Perfection Cake

A light, fluffy cake made with powdered sugar, butter, milk, flour, corn starch, egg whites, and baking powder, topped with caramel icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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White Perfection Cake

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 ↓

White Perfection 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.

Make the cake batter

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

  2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and powdered sugar until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the sweet milk and mix well.

  4. Sift together the flour, corn-starch, and baking powder, then gradually add to the butter mixture.

  5. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, then gently fold them into the batter.

Bake the cake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the caramel icing

  1. For the caramel icing, combine 2 cups powdered sugar, ⅓ cup sweet milk, and 1 tablespoon butter in a saucepan.

  2. Boil for 10 minutes, stirring constantly, then set the saucepan in cold water and stir until cool.

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

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

  2. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + corntop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air that lightens and raises the cake's crumb.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add richness and tender texture.
Powdered sugar
Creamed with butter for a fine, tender crumb and gentle sweetness.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises.
Corn-starch
Softens the flour's gluten, giving the cake a finer, more tender texture.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold air that gives the cake its lift. Stirring them in vigorously deflates the foam, leaving a dense cake, so fold gently until just combined.

“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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