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Dessert

Chocolate Fudge Cake

A moist chocolate cake with nuts and raisins, folded with beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Chocolate Fudge Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter, egg yolks, and granulated sugar together.

  2. Add the ground chocolate and milk, mixing well.

  3. Stir in the chopped nuts, flour, vanilla extract, floured raisins, and baking powder.

  4. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in three layers or in long pans.

  2. Cut into squares and slice.

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. 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. Nuts + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together638 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

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

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

Egg whites
Beaten whites trap air, giving the cake lift and a lighter crumb when folded in.
Egg yolks
Add richness and fat, helping the batter emulsify and bake tender.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the cake rise.
Ground bitter chocolate
Adds deep chocolate flavour and fat, and contributes to the dense, fudgy texture.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the batter and, creamed with butter, helps create a tender crumb.

The step that matters

Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Beaten egg whites hold the air that lifts the cake. Stirring vigorously knocks that air out, leaving a flatter, denser result.

Swap the nuts

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

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

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