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Dessert

Custard Cake

A baked cake with a custard filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Custard 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 cake

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix the sugar, flour, egg yolks, cold water, salt, baking soda, and cream of tartar until smooth.

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

Make the custard filling

  1. For the filling, combine the eggs, sugar, milk, and flour in a saucepan.

  2. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and flavor with vanilla.

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

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

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

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

  4. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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

Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the cake and thickens the filling.
Egg yolks
Add richness and structure, helping the batter set and bake firm.
Eggs
Thicken the filling as they cook and add richness and structure.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar to release gas, helping the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter and works with baking soda to lift the cake.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and filling and contributes to browning in the bake.

The step that matters

Cook the custard filling over medium heat. Stirring constantly keeps the eggs and milk from scorching or curdling on the bottom of the pan. The egg proteins set gradually, so the filling thickens smoothly only when heat stays moderate and steady.

“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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