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Dessert

Plain Cake

A basic cake with butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder, milk, and chocolate frosting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Plain Cake

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Plain 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 batter

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

  2. Add the beaten egg yolks and mix well.

  3. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

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

  5. Stir in enough milk to make a smooth batter.

  6. Flavor as desired and pour into a greased baking pan.

Bake and make the frosting

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick comes out clean.

  2. For the frosting, beat the egg white until stiff.

  3. Gradually add 2 cups of sugar and mix well.

  4. Melt the chocolate and mix it with 4 tablespoons of boiling milk, then combine with the frosting.

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

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Butter
Creams with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich texture.
Eggs
Egg yolks add richness and structure, while whipped whites help the cake rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the cake rise and become light.
Milk
Adds moisture and loosens the batter to a smooth consistency.
Chocolate
Gives the frosting its flavor and rich color.

The step that matters

Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Whipped egg whites hold air that makes the cake light. Vigorous stirring knocks that air out, leaving a dense, flat 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.

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