Skip to main content
Dessert

Marble Cake

A layered cake made with alternating white and dark batters of sugar, butter, eggs, flour, spices, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Marble 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.

Make the batters

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

  2. In a bowl, cream together the white sugar and ½ cup butter until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the egg whites and milk, mixing well.

  4. Gradually add 2 cups of flour and 1 teaspoon baking powder, stirring until combined.

  5. In another bowl, mix the brown sugar, ½ cup butter, nutmeg, cinnamon, milk, allspice, molasses, and egg yolks.

  6. Add 2 cups of flour and 1 teaspoon baking powder to the dark mixture, stirring until smooth.

Layer and bake

  1. Pour half of the white batter into a greased cake pan, then layer with the dark batter, and top with the remaining white batter.

  2. Swirl the batters together gently with a knife.

  3. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center 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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creams with the sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Eggs
Whites add structure and lift; yolks add richness and moisture to the dark batter.
Flour
Forms the cake's structure once its proteins set in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and stays light.
Molasses
Adds moisture, deep color and a slightly sweet, bitter flavor to the dark batter.
Brown sugar
Adds moisture, caramel notes and color to the dark batter.

The step that matters

Swirling the batters. Swirl gently and only once or twice. Overmixing blends the light and dark batters into an even brown color and knocks out the air the baking powder relies on, making the cake denser.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Allspicethe original
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Gingerfits less well

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

More marble cake recipes

Chocolate 23 See all 221 →

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesCinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipes