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Dessert

Sunshine Cake

A light cake made with egg whites, yolks, sugar, and flour, baked in an angel food cake pan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

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

  2. Measure the flour and sift the flour.

  3. Measure the sugar and sift the sugar.

  4. Separate the eggs, placing the whites in one bowl and the yolks in another.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the yolks until light and stiff.

  2. Beat the egg whites until foamy, then add cream of tartar to the egg whites.

  3. Beat the egg whites until very stiff.

  4. Cut the sugar and fold it in.

  5. Add the yolks to the batter.

  6. Add any flavoring.

  7. Fold in the flour gently.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into an angel food cake pan.

  2. Bake for 45 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. Cream + flourtop 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 a foam that gives the cake its light, airy structure.
Egg yolks
Beaten and folded in to add richness and tenderness to the crumb.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps stabilise the whipped egg whites.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the egg whites, helping them whip to a stable, stiff foam.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as it bakes.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites until very stiff. Whites must be whipped to a stable foam before the sugar and flour are folded in. Under-whipped whites collapse during folding and baking, leaving a dense, short cake, while gentle folding keeps the air that makes it rise.

“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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