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Dessert

Chocolate Marble Cake

A chocolate and vanilla marble cake baked at 350°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Chocolate 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.

Prepare

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

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

  3. Add the milk, flour, egg, cream of tartar, baking soda, and vanilla extract. Mix until well combined.

  4. Divide the batter in half. Stir the melted chocolate into one half.

Marble and bake

  1. In a prepared cake tin, alternate spoonfuls of the light and dark batter.

  2. Bake for 30-35 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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

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

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

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

Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air and add richness and a tender crumb.
Flour
Forms the cake's structure once mixed with the liquids and egg.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure and richness.
Cream of tartar
Stabilizes the batter and helps the leavening work with baking soda.
Baking soda
Reacts with the batter's acidity to produce gas, helping the cake rise.
Melted chocolate
Adds deep chocolate flavor and darkens one half of the batter.

The step that matters

Alternating the light and dark batter. Spooning the batters in alternating layers, rather than mixing them, keeps two distinct colors. Stirring too much blends them into an even brown batter with no marbling.

“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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