Skip to main content
Dessert

Chocolate Cake

A moist chocolate cake made with flour, sugar, butter, sour cream, eggs, baking soda, chocolate, milk, molasses, water, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Chocolate 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

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

  2. In a large bowl, beat the sugar and softened butter together until creamy.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Gradually add the flour, then mix in the sour cream and baking soda.

Make the chocolate mixture

  1. For the chocolate mixture, combine the chocolate, milk, molasses, water, and butter in a saucepan.

  2. Cook over medium heat, stirring until thickened, then add vanilla extract.

Bake

  1. Pour the chocolate mixture into the batter and mix until well combined.

  2. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

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

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

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

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

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Cream + chocolatetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,466 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as the cake sets in the oven.
Flour
Forms the structure of the cake crumb as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness through fat in the batter.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour cream and molasses to make the cake rise.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown and stay tender.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color and a deep, slightly acidic flavor.

The step that matters

Thickening the chocolate mixture. Cooking over medium heat while stirring keeps the mixture smooth and prevents scorching or lumps. Stopping at the right thickness matters because the mixture is then blended into the batter, and an overcooked mixture can make the cake dense.

“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.

More chocolate cake recipes

Filling 18French 14Marbled 13Black 11Dark 10Marble 7 See all 565 →

You might also like

Chocolate CreamChocolate Cream171 recipesVanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipes