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Dessert

Water-melon Cake

A layered cake with white and red sugar batters, lemon and vanilla, and currants.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 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 ↓

Water-melon 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 2 cups of white sugar and ⅔ cup of butter, then add ½ cup of milk and the egg whites, mixing well.

  3. Sift in 3 cups of flour and 1 teaspoon of baking powder, then add 2 teaspoons of lemon extract to make the white batter.

  4. In another bowl, cream together 1 cup of red sugar sand and ⅓ cup of butter.

  5. Mix in ⅔ cup of milk, 2 cups of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, and the egg yolks, then stir in 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and ½ pound of currants to make the red batter.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a cake pan, pour in the red batter, drop in the currants, and then cover with the white batter.

  2. Bake until done, then frost as desired.

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs
Egg whites and yolks add structure and richness to the batter.
Butter
Creaming butter with sugar traps air and gives the cake a tender, rich crumb.
All-purpose flour
Flour provides the main structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and becomes light.
White sugar
Sugar sweetens the batter and helps create a tender, browned crumb.
Milk
Milk adds moisture and helps hydrate the flour for a soft texture.

The step that matters

Layering the red and white batters in the pan. Pouring the two batters gently keeps them from mixing too much, so the colored layers and currants stay distinct after baking.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Figfits better
  2. Blackberryfits better
  3. Blueberryfits better
  4. Currantthe original

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