Skip to main content
Dessert

Corn-starch Cake

A sweet cake made with corn starch, sugar, butter, eggs, baking powder, and flavoring.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Corn and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,345 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Corn-starch 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 your oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. Cream together the sugar and butter until smooth.

  2. Beat the egg yolks well and add them to the mixture.

  3. Alternately add the corn starch and beaten egg whites to the mixture.

  4. Mix the baking powder with a handful of flour and add it to the batter.

  5. Add flavoring to taste.

Bake and assemble

  1. Pour the batter into four cake pans.

  2. Bake until golden.

  3. Once cooled, layer the cakes with icing between each.

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. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

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

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Corn + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,168 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the batter, while beaten whites add air and lift to the crumb.
Butter
Fat creamed with sugar adds richness and a tender texture.
Sugar
Creamed with butter, it adds sweetness and helps give the cake a fine texture.
Corn starch
Adds a fine, tender crumb and a lighter texture than flour alone.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the cakes rise in the oven.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Alternate the corn starch with the beaten egg whites and mix gently so the air in the whites stays in the batter. Overmixing knocks out that air and leaves a dense, tough cake.

“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.

You might also like

Corn CakeCorn Cake90 recipesCorn CakesCorn Cakes22 recipesGreen Corn PuddingGreen Corn Pudding14 recipesCornstarch Blanc MangerCornstarch Blanc Manger12 recipes