Skip to main content
Dessert

White Mountain Cake

A cake made from flour, sugar, butter, eggs, and cream, finished with a lemon‑flavored icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Vehling, Joseph Dommers, 1879-1950. fmo · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

White Mountain Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake batter

  1. Combine two thirds cupful of butter, whites of nine eggs, two cupfuls of white sugar, four cupfuls of flour, half a cupful of milk, and one teaspoon of baking powder.

  2. Divide the mixture into four parts and bake in jelly cake pans.

Make the icing

  1. For the icing, combine one pound pulverized sugar and whites of four eggs.

  2. Dissolve one teaspoon citric acid in two dessert spoonfuls of alcohol, and add to the icing after it is well beaten.

  3. Put in a little indigo, and flavor with lemon.

Make the second cake and finish

  1. Let the cakes cool before icing.

  2. Combine one cupful of corn starch, two cupfuls of flour, one cupful of butter, two cupfuls of sugar, whites of seven eggs, nearly one cupful of rich cream, one teaspoon cream of tartar, and half a teaspoon soda.

  3. Beat the whites of four eggs.

  4. Boil one pound of sugar until it sinks in water.

  5. Pour the hot sugar slowly over the egg while beating until nearly cold.

  6. Melt chocolate in some of the egg and add according to taste.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

884Calories
28 gProtein
31 gFat
121 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
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
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 Vehling, Joseph Dommers, 1879-1950. fmo. 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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  4. Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Milk + teatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together738 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites provide structure and lift, and make the icing light and foamy when beaten.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, when boiled, gives the icing its body.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake.
Cream of tartar
Stabilizes beaten egg whites so they hold their volume.

The step that matters

Pour the hot sugar slowly over the egg while beating. Pouring the syrup in a slow stream while beating lets it cook the egg whites gently and form a stable, glossy meringue. Dumping it in at once can deflate the foam or scramble the egg.

“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.

More white mountain cake recipes

Philadelphia 3 See all 115 →

You might also like

Corn CakeCorn Cake90 recipesCorn Starch CakeCorn Starch Cake89 recipesCorn CakesCorn Cakes22 recipesGreen Corn PuddingGreen Corn Pudding14 recipes