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Dessert

Cream Cakes

A layered cake made with eggs, sugar, flour, milk, butter, vanilla, water, spices, rose water, and topped with marmalade and icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 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 Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg and mix with sugar and flour until combined.

  2. In a saucepan, bring the milk to a boil, then stir in the egg mixture and butter until thickened.

  3. Let cool, then mix in vanilla.

Make the choux paste

  1. Boil water and add butter until melted, then stir in flour until well mixed.

  2. Remove from heat and let cool, then mix in eggs one at a time until a stiff paste forms.

  3. Drop spoonfuls onto buttered baking sheets and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 15-20 minutes.

Make the icing and finish

  1. For the icing, cream together sugar and butter until light.

  2. Beat the yolks of eggs and sift in flour, spices, and rose water; mix well.

  3. Roll out to ½ inch thick, cut into shapes, and bake quickly.

  4. Once cooled, spread each cake with marmalade.

  5. Beat egg whites until light, then add powdered sugar and lemon for icing.

  6. Spread icing on top of each cake and bake until pale 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. 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
Bind the paste and set the custard, adding structure and richness to the cakes.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the paste and icing a tender texture.
Flour
Forms the starch structure that holds the cakes and paste together as they bake.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the icing become light and creamy when creamed.
Milk
Forms the body of the custard, adding moisture and richness when thickened.
Egg whites
Whipped until light, they add airiness to the icing.

The step that matters

Add the eggs one at a time to the cooled paste. Eggs added too quickly or to warm dough can curdle or thin the batter. Adding them gradually, once the paste has cooled, lets each egg blend in and produces a stiff paste that holds its shape when baked.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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