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Dessert

Ice Cream Cake

A layered cake topped with a candied sugar syrup and flavored with lemon juice and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Shutt, William E., Mrs., [from old catalog] comp · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Ice Cream Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake

  1. Combine one cup butter, two cups sugar, one cup milk, the whites of eight eggs, two cups flour, one cup corn starch, and two teaspoons baking powder.

  2. Bake the batter in two layers.

Make the filling

  1. Boil four cups sugar and one cup water together until clear and candied.

  2. Pour the syrup over the whites of four well-beaten eggs, beating hard until a stiff cream.

  3. Add a tablespoonful of lemon juice and flavor with vanilla.

  4. Spread the mixture between and over the cakes.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

845Calories
28 gProtein
26 gFat
124 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 7 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Shutt, William E., Mrs., [from old catalog] comp. 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. See the original page.

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

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor in the cake.
Eggs
Whites beaten into the syrup form a stiff, airy structure for the frosting.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake layers together.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, boiled with water, forms the syrup that sets the frosting.
Baking powder
Releases gas that makes the cake batter rise and become light.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweet filling and helps keep it stable.

The step that matters

Pour the syrup over the whites of four well-beaten eggs, beating hard until a stiff cream.. The hot syrup must be poured in a thin stream while beating so it cooks the egg whites into a stable foam. Pouring too fast or too slowly can leave the cream runny or lumpy.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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