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Dessert

Chocolate Nougat

A chocolate cake with a chocolate frosting made from butter, powdered sugar, egg, flour, baking powder, milk, and chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Nougat

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake batter

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add the powdered sugar and mix well.

  3. Beat in the egg until well combined.

  4. In a separate bowl, mix the baking powder with the bread flour.

  5. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk to the butter mixture.

  6. Melt the Baker's chocolate.

  7. Mix the melted chocolate with the sugar and milk until smooth.

  8. Allow the chocolate mixture to cool, then add it to the cake batter.

  9. Stir in the vanilla.

Bake and frost

  1. Bake the mixture in three separate sheets.

  2. To make the frosting, boil the sugar and water until it threads.

  3. Slowly pour the syrup onto the beaten egg white while mixing with an egg beater.

  4. Remove the beater and continue mixing with a spoon until cool enough to spread.

  5. Flavor the frosting with vanilla or lemon juice.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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
Creams with the sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich texture.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the oven.
Bread flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Baker's chocolate
Adds chocolate flavor and color to the batter.
Egg white
Whipped with hot syrup to form a stable, spreadable frosting.

The step that matters

Pouring the syrup onto the egg white. Hot sugar syrup must be poured slowly while beating so it cooks the egg white and forms a smooth, stable foam instead of scrambling or deflating.

“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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