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Dessert

Madeira Cake

A moist cake made with eggs, milk, flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, butter, sugar, lemon and vanilla extracts.

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 ↓

Madeira 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.

Prepare

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

  2. Rub together butter and sugar until creamy.

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

Make the batter

  1. Dissolve baking soda in milk and add to the mixture.

  2. Sift cream of tartar through the flour and mix in.

  3. Flavor the batter with lemon and vanilla extracts.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan and bake until golden brown.

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. 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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

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
Add structure and richness, setting as the cake bakes.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas for rising.
Cream of tartar
Provides acidity that works with baking soda to help the cake rise.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and helps trap air when creamed with sugar.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps browning, and aerates the butter when creamed.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda and cream of tartar to the batter. Baking soda needs an acid to react, and the reaction produces gas that lifts the cake. Mixing these leavening agents in evenly and without delay ensures a uniform rise and an even crumb.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Figfits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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