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Dessert

White Cake

A simple cake made with sugar, butter, egg whites, sweet milk, flour, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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White Cake

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 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).

Make the batter

  1. Cream together the sugar and butter.

  2. Gradually stir in the milk and flour, a little at a time.

  3. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the batter.

Bake and cool

  1. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake until golden brown.

  2. Allow to cool before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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
Creams with sugar to trap air and add tenderness and richness to the crumb.
Egg whites
Beaten until stiff, they add lift and give the cake a light, airy structure.
Flour
Provides the main structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cake rise in the oven.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, creamed with butter, helps create a tender texture and browning.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites until stiff. Under-beaten whites will not hold air and the cake will be dense; over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy and collapse when folded in. Fold gently to keep the air in the batter.

“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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