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Dessert

Almond Cake

A sweet almond cake with a filling of beaten egg whites, yolks, sugar, almonds, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Almond Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Gradually add the milk.

  3. Fold in the egg whites and flour.

  4. Pour the batter into jelly tins.

  5. Bake the batter.

Make the almond filling

  1. Beat the whites and yolks of 2 eggs together lightly.

  2. Add 1½ cups of sugar.

  3. Mix in the pounded almonds and vanilla.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Corn + almondtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together485 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake's crumb together as it bakes.
Egg whites
Trap air that lifts the batter and help set the cake's structure.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender texture by coating flour and carrying fat through the crumb.
Sugar
Creaming with butter traps air, and sugar adds sweetness and helps browning.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the egg whites, stabilizing them so they hold their foam while mixing.
Blanched almonds
Pounded fine, they add moisture, dense texture and nutty flavor to the filling.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites and flour. Egg whites hold air that gives the cake its lift. Overmixing or stirring vigorously deflates the foam, leaving a dense, heavy 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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