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Dessert

Fine Venetian Cake or Cakes

A cake made from almond paste, flour, butter, sugar, eggs, and lemon zest, baked into thin slices or small cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Acton · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Fine Venetian Cake or Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the paste

  1. Take seven ounces of blanched Jordan almonds and one of bitter almonds.

  2. Pound the almonds into a perfect paste with a few drops of egg whites or orange‑flower water.

  3. Mix the almond paste thoroughly with one pound of flour and eight ounces of butter (cool and firm).

  4. Break the mixture down into small pieces.

  5. Add eight ounces of pounded sugar and the rind of a fine lemon that has been rasped and crushed to powder.

  6. Incorporate the yolks of four eggs (or fewer if large) into the mixture.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll the paste into a layer less than a quarter of an inch thick.

  2. Cut the layer into six or seven equal portions with a larger fluted cutter.

  3. Place the portions on lightly floured or buttered tins.

  4. Bake in a slow oven until firm, crisp, and pale brown.

  5. If needed, stack the portions while still warm and place a baking tin with a slight weight to level them.

Assemble and finish

  1. When cold, spread a preserve on each portion and stack them evenly into the form of a whole cake.

  2. Optionally, ice the top and decorate with pistachio nuts, colored sugar grains, or a wreath of almond‑paste leaves.

  3. For small Venetian cakes, roll the same paste into balls.

  4. Flatten the balls to about a third of an inch thick.

  5. Brush the flattened cakes with beaten egg.

  6. Cover them with white sugar‑candy crushed about half the size of a pea.

  7. Bake in a slow oven.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

696Calories
20 gProtein
18 gFat
112 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12

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

By Eliza Acton. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Almonds (in the method)
Provide the main flavour and the body of the paste.
Flour
Gives the paste structure so the portions hold their shape when baked.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the cakes tender and crisp when cool and firm.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the crust brown during baking.
Eggs
Yolks bind the paste and add richness and colour.

The step that matters

Bake in a slow oven until firm, crisp, and pale brown. A slow oven dries the thin portions evenly without over-browning the sugar and butter, so they set crisp rather than burnt or soft.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, 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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