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Dessert

Almond Cake

A baked almond cake made with butter, sugar, flour, egg whites, almond extract, and blanched almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Almond Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Blanch the almonds.

  3. Slice the blanched almonds very thin.

  4. Rub a little flour on the sliced almonds.

  5. In a bowl, mix the sugar, baking soda, warm water, cinnamon, and ginger until stiff.

Make the batter

  1. In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add the flour, cream or milk, egg whites, cream of tartar, baking soda, and almond extract to the butter mixture.

  3. Stir gently until combined, but do not beat.

  4. Fold in the prepared almonds.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake until golden.

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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Trap air and add structure as the cake sets.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender crumb and rich flavor.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together.
Almonds
Add nutty flavor and a textured crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with acid to release gas, helping the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acid that stabilizes the egg whites and supports rising.

The step that matters

Stir gently, do not beat. Once the flour is added, overmixing develops gluten and makes the cake tough. Beating also deflates the air trapped in the egg whites, so the cake rises less and has a denser texture.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, butter, flour, cream, egg, almond. 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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