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Dessert

Imperial Cake

A butter and egg-based cake with sugar, flour, milk, and baking powder.

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

Imperial Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Mix the batter

  1. Cream the butter until smooth.

  2. Work 2 cups of flour into the creamed butter.

  3. Beat the yolks and sugar together until well combined.

  4. Soften the mixture with the milk.

  5. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold into the mixture.

  6. Add the remaining flour and mix well.

  7. Sift the baking powder into the batter and mix thoroughly.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into a greased pan and bake at 300°F (150°C) until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 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
Creamed with sugar, it traps air and provides richness and a tender crumb.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and binding, while whipped whites add structure and lift.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a fine, tender texture when creamed.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it sets.
Milk
Adds moisture and softens the mixture so it blends evenly.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the cake rise and become light.

The step that matters

Folding in the stiff egg whites. The whites hold air that gives the cake its lift. Folding gently keeps those bubbles intact, while vigorous stirring deflates the batter and leads to a dense 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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