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Dessert

Velvet Cake

A light, chocolate‑flavored cake with a smooth frosting made from melted chocolate, sugar, milk, and egg yolk.

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

Velvet 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.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add the sugar, mixing well.

  3. Beat in the egg yolks and cold water.

  4. In another bowl, mix the flour, corn starch, and baking powder.

  5. Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and mix well.

  6. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the batter.

Bake and frost

  1. Pour the batter into a sheet pan and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

  2. For the frosting, melt the chocolate in a double boiler.

  3. Stir in the sugar and milk, cooking until smooth.

  4. Add the egg yolk and cook for one more minute.

  5. Pour the frosting over the cooled 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender crumb.
Egg whites
Whipped stiff and folded in to lighten the batter and help it rise.
Egg yolks
Add richness and emulsify the batter for a smooth, tender texture.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets as the cake bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cake rises.
Baker's chocolate
Gives the frosting its chocolate flavor and body.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stiff whites hold the air that lightens the batter. Folding gently, rather than stirring, keeps that air from collapsing, so the cake rises evenly and stays light.

“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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