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Dessert

Cream Layer Cake

A layer cake with a cream filling, given in both a cooked and an uncooked version.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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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 ↓

Cream Layer 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.

Bake the cake

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

  2. In a bowl, beat together 3 eggs, 1 cup powdered sugar, 1½ cups flour, 3 tablespoons water, and 2 teaspoons baking powder.

  3. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan.

  4. Bake until golden.

Make the cooked cream filling

  1. For the cream filling, scald 1 pint of milk in a double boiler.

  2. Add ½ cup sugar, 2 tablespoons butter, and 1 tablespoon corn starch to the milk.

  3. Stir until thickened.

  4. Flavor with vanilla or lemon.

Make the uncooked cream filling

  1. For the uncooked cream filling, whip 1 pint of cream until stiff.

  2. Fold in 6 tablespoons sugar and the beaten egg whites from 2 eggs, then mix well.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Flour
Forms the cake's structure as its proteins set during baking.
Eggs
Add structure and richness to the cake batter.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps keep its crumb tender.
Cream
Gives the uncooked filling richness, body and a smooth mouthfeel.
Milk
Adds moisture and body to the cooked filling as it thickens.

The step that matters

Fold in the sugar and beaten egg whites. Whipped cream and egg whites hold air bubbles that give the filling its lightness. Folding gently keeps that air in, while overmixing can deflate the cream and make the filling 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.

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