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Dessert

Cream Sponge Cake

A sponge cake layered with custard filling.

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 ↓

Cream Sponge 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

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix powdered sugar and egg yolks together.

  3. Beat egg whites until light and fluffy.

  4. Gradually add flour and egg whites, repeating until all ingredients are used.

  5. Pour batter into two layers and bake until golden.

Make the custard

  1. For custard, heat milk in a saucepan.

  2. In a separate bowl, whisk together egg, sugar, cornstarch, and vanilla.

  3. Slowly add hot milk to egg mixture, stirring constantly.

  4. Return mixture to saucepan and cook until thickened, then add lump of butter.

  5. Let custard cool before using it as filling between cake layers.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs
Whipped whites trap air, giving the sponge its light, airy structure.
Flour
Provides the starch and protein that set the cake's structure as it bakes.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps keep the crumb tender and moist.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard and adds richness.
Cornstarch
Thickens the custard as it heats, giving it a smooth, set texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the custard a smooth, silky finish.

The step that matters

Cook the custard until thickened. Cornstarch thickens only when the mixture reaches a full simmer while stirred constantly. Undercooking leaves it runny, and overheating or stirring too little can scorch or lump the egg.

Swap the vanilla

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

  1. Vanillathe original
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Peachfits less well

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