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Dessert

Mary Poch

A chocolate cake with buttercream filling, made from milk, chocolate, flour, sugar, eggs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Paidar, Marie, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 81,283 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Mary Poch

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chocolate mixture

  1. Boil together half cup of milk with half a cup of bitter chocolate until thick.

Make the batter

  1. In a separate bowl, combine one and a half cups of sugar, half a cup of butter, half a cup of milk, three eggs, two cups of flour, one teaspoon soda in a little boiling water, and one teaspoon baking powder, then mix part one with part two.

Bake and fill

  1. Bake in layers.

  2. Beat together one and a half tablespoons of butter, one and a half cups powdered sugar, one teaspoon milk, and one teaspoon vanilla until smooth.

  3. Spread filling between layers and on top.

By Paidar, Marie, 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Milk + teatop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together738 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Chocolate + teatop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together163 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 124,287 recipes mention both: they likely 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

Flour
Forms the structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and lift as they set.
Baking soda
Releases gas during baking to help the cake rise.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking to help the cake rise.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and richer flavour in the cake and filling.
Bitter chocolate
Provides chocolate flavour and dark colour, and thickens when boiled with milk.

The step that matters

Boiling the chocolate and milk until thick. Milk and chocolate can scorch or separate if the heat is too high or they are left unattended. Cooking them until thick gives the mixture the body needed to spread and flavour the cake evenly, so stir steadily while it boils.

“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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