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Dessert

Italian Chocolate Cake

A moist chocolate cake made with butter, sugar, chocolate, coffee, flour, baking powder, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and coffee are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,497 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells buttery, creamy. The science ↓

Italian 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.

Prepare the batter

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

  2. Rub the butter and sugar together until creamy.

  3. Add the grated chocolate and cold coffee, mixing well.

  4. Sift the browned flour with the baking powder and add to the mixture.

  5. Finally, fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

Bake and finish

  1. Pour the batter into a loaf pan or two layer pans.

  2. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

  3. Use white or chocolate icing to frost the cake.

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. Chocolate + coffeetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,497 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 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).

Butter and flour 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 whites
Beaten whites trap air, giving the cake lift and a light, airy crumb.
Browned flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake together as it sets in the oven.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the batter rise.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender, creamy-textured batter with the butter.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a moist, tender texture.
Grated baker's chocolate
Gives the cake its chocolate flavor and deep color.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Beaten egg whites hold air that makes the cake rise. Stirring them vigorously deflates the foam, leaving a dense cake, so fold gently until just combined.

“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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