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Dessert

Mocha Cake

Mocha Cake is a chocolate and coffee flavored cake with a chocolate filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Mocha 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.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl.

  2. Add the egg yolk and cream again until smooth.

  3. Stir in the milk, salt, and vanilla extract.

  4. Sift the flour with the baking powder three times, then add to the mixture.

  5. Mix in the melted chocolate until well combined.

  6. Gently fold in the beaten egg white.

Bake and fill

  1. Pour the batter into two greased cake pans.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick comes out clean.

  3. Cool and fill with chocolate filling.

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

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

  2. Vanilla + chocolatetop 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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a light, aerated batter when creamed.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and fat, and helps emulsify the batter for a smooth texture.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
Egg white
Folded in whipped to add lift and an airy, delicate structure.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the beaten egg white. Folding rather than stirring keeps the air bubbles in the beaten white intact. Those bubbles help the cake rise and give it a light texture, so overmixing will leave it dense.

“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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