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Dessert

Porcupine Cake

A butter, milk, sugar, flour, baking powder, and almond cake topped with a sweet almond glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Porcupine 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 cake

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

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the milk and mix well.

  4. Sift together the flour and baking powder, then gradually add to the wet mixture.

  5. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the cream and assemble

  1. Once the cake is cold, stick the soft almonds over the top.

  2. In a double boiler, combine the eggs, quart of milk, sugar, corn starch, and vanilla.

  3. Cook over hot water, stirring constantly until thickened.

  4. Pour the cream over the cake before serving.

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. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Almond + corntop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together485 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the cake a tender crumb.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cake batter as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises and stays light.
Eggs
Thicken the cream as they cook and add richness to it.
Corn starch
Thickens the cream so it sets to a smooth, spoonable texture.
Soft almonds
Add texture and a nutty flavour to the cake's top.

The step that matters

Stirring the cream over hot water. Eggs and starch thicken the custard gently. If the heat is too high or stirring stops, the eggs can scramble and the cream turns lumpy instead of smooth.

“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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