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Dessert

German Coffee Cake

A yeasted cake baked at 400°F with butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

German Coffee Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sponge

  1. Pour boiling water over cream.

  2. Dissolve yeast in cooled boiled water.

  3. Add the dissolved yeast to the lukewarm cream and water.

  4. Beat in sifted flour.

  5. Cover the mixture.

  6. Let stand until light.

Make and shape the dough

  1. Add melted butter, salt, sugar, eggs, and enough flour to make a kneadable dough.

  2. Knead until elastic.

  3. Cover the dough.

  4. Let rise until light.

  5. Shape the dough into a sheet 1.5 inches thick.

  6. Cut the sheet to fit baking pans.

  7. Let the shaped dough rise until nearly doubled in bulk.

  8. Refrigerate the dough.

Bake

  1. In the morning, brush the top with melted butter.

  2. Sprinkle the top with sugar and cinnamon.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 25 minutes.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Add richness and structure to the dough, helping it hold its shape as it bakes.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become light.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the dough its elasticity and structure.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and browns the crust when brushed on top.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, softening the crumb and adding moisture.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning to the topping.

The step that matters

Let the sponge stand until light. Yeast needs time to ferment before the rest of the dough is added. If the sponge is not fully bubbly, the dough will rise slowly and turn out 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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