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Dessert

Swiss Cream Cakes

A light, airy cake made with Swiss condensed milk, butter, lard, and coconut icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and coconut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,294 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Swiss Cream Cakes

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 batter

  1. Mix salt and baking soda in hot water.

  2. Add Swiss condensed milk, butter, lard, and caster sugar; beat well.

  3. Incorporate vanilla and musk or rose essence.

  4. Gradually add whipped egg whites, one spoonful at a time.

  5. Blend in the mixed flours without beating.

Bake and top

  1. Pour into well-buttered round cake tins and bake at 350°F (175°C) until pale brown.

  2. While cakes bake, mix grated coconut with egg whites and enough sugar to form a stiff mixture.

  3. Once cakes cool, spread the coconut icing on top and return to the oven for 1 minute to set.

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. Vanilla + coconuttop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,294 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  3. Condensed milk + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together804 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Butter + coconuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Condensed milk + coconuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together239 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Egg whites
Whipped whites trap air, giving the cakes a light, airy structure as they set in the oven.
Vienna flour
Flour provides the starch and gluten that give the cakes their body and crumb structure.
English flour
Flour provides the starch and gluten that give the cakes their body and crumb structure.
Swiss condensed milk
Milk solids and sugar add sweetness and help the cakes brown and stay moist.
Butter
Fat adds richness and a tender crumb to the cakes.
Baking soda
Reacts with the hot liquid to release gas, helping the cakes rise.

The step that matters

Gradually add whipped egg whites, one spoonful at a time. Adding the whites slowly lets them blend into the batter without deflating the air they hold, which keeps the cakes light.

Swap the coconut

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

  1. Coconutthe original
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Raspberryfits less well
  4. Figfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against condensed milk, butter, sugar, vanilla, rose, egg, flour. 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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