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Dessert

Sunshine Cake

A light, airy cake made with egg whites, yolks, sugar, flour, cream of tartar, and orange extract.

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

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.

Prepare

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

Make the batter

  1. Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth.

  2. Stir in the sugar, then the beaten yolks.

  3. Add the flour and cream of tartar, mixing well.

  4. Pour the batter into a square tin.

Bake and cool

  1. Bake until done, then remove from the oven.

  2. Turn the pan upside down on a brick to cool completely.

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. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

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

  5. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

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 into foam that traps air, giving the cake its light, risen structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps stabilise the whipped egg white foam.
Egg yolks
Add richness and moisture, producing a tender crumb.
Flour
Provides structure that sets around the air bubbles during baking.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the egg whites, stabilising the foam so it holds its volume.
Orange extract
Adds a bright citrus aroma that carries the cake's flavour.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth. The whipped whites supply the air that makes the cake rise. Under-beaten whites collapse and give a dense cake, while over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy and lose their elasticity, so the cake can fall or crack.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, flour, cream):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, flour, cream. 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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