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Dessert

Layer Cake

A simple cake made in layers with a lemon filling.

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

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Layer 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 cake

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix sugar, flour, milk, eggs, cream of tartar, and baking soda or baking powder until smooth.

  3. Divide batter into three layers and bake until golden.

Make the filling

  1. Beat together lemon rind, lemon juice, egg, sugar, and butter for the filling.

  2. Cook the filling mixture over low heat until thick.

Assemble

  1. Spread the filling between the cooled layers of cake.

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 + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + walnuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake's layers together as it bakes.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the batter set as it bakes.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the cake brown and stay tender.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter, helping the leavening work and stabilising the texture.
Baking soda or baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, making the cake rise and become light.
Lemon
Adds acidity and aroma to the filling, balancing its sweetness.

The step that matters

Cook the filling over low heat until thick. The egg thickens as it heats, but too much heat can scramble it. Gentle, steady heat and constant stirring give a smooth, thick filling.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

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