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Dessert

Sunshine Cake

A light, airy cake made from egg whites, yolks, sugar, flour, cream of tartar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Sunshine Cake

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Sunshine 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. Sift the flour and sugar together 5 times and set aside.

  2. Beat the egg yolks well.

  3. Beat the egg whites until frothy, then add the cream of tartar and beat until stiff peaks form.

Make the batter

  1. Gently fold in the sugar, then mix in the beaten yolks.

  2. Add the sifted flour and any desired flavoring.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a tube pan and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 35 to 50 minutes.

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

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

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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 stiff peaks, they trap air and give the cake its light, airy structure.
Egg yolks
Add richness, moisture and color to the batter.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps make the whipped whites stable and tender.
Pastry flour
Provides gentle structure while keeping the crumb tender because of its low protein.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the egg whites, helping them whip to a stable, stiff foam.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the sugar. Whipped egg whites hold air that gives this cake its rise. Heavy stirring knocks that air out, so the sugar and flour should be folded in gently and only until combined.

“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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