Skip to main content
Dessert

Marble Cake

A layered cake with alternating white and dark batter, flavored with cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, and black pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cinnamon and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,536 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Marble 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 batters

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

  2. In a bowl, cream together the white sugar and ½ cup butter until light and fluffy.

  3. Add ½ cup milk and the beaten egg whites, mixing well.

  4. In another bowl, combine 2½ cups flour and 2 teaspoons baking powder.

  5. Gradually add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients, mixing until just combined.

  6. In a separate bowl, cream together the brown sugar and ½ cup butter.

  7. Add ½ cup milk and the egg yolks, mixing well.

  8. In another bowl, combine 2½ cups flour, 2 teaspoons baking powder, cinnamon, allspice, black pepper, and grated nutmeg.

  9. Gradually add the flour mixture to the brown sugar mixture, mixing until just combined.

Bake

  1. To create the marble effect, alternate spoonfuls of the white and dark batter in a greased cake pan.

  2. Bake for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

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. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cinnamon + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,890 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they add lift and an airy, light crumb.
Egg yolks
Add richness, tenderness and color to the dark batter.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it adds fat for a tender texture and rich flavor.
All-purpose flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake's crumb as the batter bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cake rise and become light.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and a molasses flavor to the dark batter.

The step that matters

Folding in the flour mixture until just combined. Overmixing once flour is added develops gluten, which makes the cake tough and dense rather than tender.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Allspicethe original
  4. Clovefits about as well

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

More marble cake recipes

Chocolate 23 See all 221 →

You might also like

Cinnamon RollsCinnamon Rolls71 recipesCinnamon CakeCinnamon Cake42 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipes