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Dessert

Hickory-nut Cake

A cake made with butter, sugar, flour, sweet milk, eggs, baking soda, cream of tartar, and hickory nuts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Hickory-nut Cake

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Hickory-nut 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

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

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add the flour and sweet milk, mixing well.

  3. Beat the egg yolks and add to the mixture.

  4. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites to a stiff froth and fold into the batter.

  5. Gently mix in the hickory-nut meats.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased pan and bake for about 30‑40 minutes or until a toothpick 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.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Egg whites
Whipped to a stiff froth, they lighten the batter and help it rise.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it adds richness and a tender crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar and batter to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter and stabilizes the whipped egg whites.
Hickory-nut meats
Add crunch and nutty flavor, and flour coating keeps them spread through the batter.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped egg whites trap air that makes the cake light. Stirring them in vigorously knocks out that air, while gentle folding keeps the batter airy and rising evenly.

“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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