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Dessert

Malt Cake

A sweet cake made with malt, sugar, nut meal, vanilla, gluten or zwieback, lemon juice, grated rind, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Malt Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the batter

  1. Separate the eggs.

  2. Beat the yolks until stiff.

  3. Add the grated lemon rind and malt gradually, beating vigorously.

  4. Beat the egg whites until very stiff.

  5. Add a pinch of salt to the egg whites and beat until frothy.

  6. Add lemon juice and beat until stiff and crumbly.

  7. Fold the yolk mixture into the egg whites.

  8. Fold in the nut meal and gluten or bread crumbs gently.

Bake and cool

  1. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven in a cake tin without oiling.

  2. Turn the cake bottom side up on another tin to cool, allowing air circulation.

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

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

  2. Malt + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27 recipes

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

  3. Vanilla + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Malt + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together325 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Eggs
Egg whites trapped in the batter provide the air and structure that lift the cake.
Malt
Adds sweetness and a distinctive malty flavour and colour to the cake.
Nut meal
Adds body and a rich, tender crumb in place of much of the flour.
Gluten or zwieback
Provides dry structure that helps the cake hold its shape after folding.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that stabilises the whipped egg whites and brightens the flavour.

The step that matters

Fold the yolk mixture into the egg whites. Folding gently keeps the air trapped in the whipped egg whites. Stirring or beating deflates the foam, leaving a dense, flat cake.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Bananafits better
  2. Peachfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against malt, sugar, vanilla, egg. 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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