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Chocolate Nut Cake

A walnut and chocolate cake with a butter‑chocolate icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Chocolate Nut Cake

Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Nut 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 the batter

  1. Reserve 4 unbroken walnut halves and chop the rest finely.

  2. Cream together the sugar and butter.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

  4. Stir in the milk and flour alternately, adding the baking powder to the last half cup of flour.

Bake and make the icing

  1. Bake in two layers at 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a saucepan, combine the butter, grated chocolate, brown sugar, and milk.

  3. Cook until it reaches the soft ball stage, then add a small piece of butter and vanilla.

  4. Keep the icing soft by placing the pan in hot water.

Assemble and finish

  1. Mix the chopped walnuts into one‑third of the icing and let it cool enough to spread between the layers.

  2. Cover the top and sides of the cake with the remaining icing and arrange the reserved walnut halves on top.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Walnut + vanillatop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,730 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set in the oven.
Flour
Forms the cake's main structure once its proteins set during baking.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in both the cake and the icing.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Walnuts
Add texture and a nutty flavor to the cake and icing.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and a deeper caramel flavor to the icing.

The step that matters

Cooking the icing to the soft ball stage. Sugar syrup that is cooked too little stays runny, and cooked too far it turns hard and grainy. Reaching the soft ball stage gives a fudge-like icing that spreads well and sets soft.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Hazelnutfits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, egg, milk, flour, chocolate, vanilla. 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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