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Dessert

Chocolate Layer Cake

A chocolate cake with a chocolate filling made from sugar, hot water, and chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 Layer Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the cake

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a bowl, mix 1 ½ cups sugar, 3 cups flour, ½ cup milk, and 2 teaspoons baking powder.

  3. Divide the batter into three layers.

  4. Bake until golden.

Make the filling

  1. For the filling, combine 1 cup sugar and ½ cup hot water in a saucepan.

  2. Add 2 squares of Baker's chocolate.

  3. Boil slowly until thickened.

  4. Flavor the filling with vanilla to taste.

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

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

  4. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake layers together.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the layers rise and become light.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown as it bakes.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness to the batter.
Baker's chocolate
Gives the filling its chocolate flavour and thickens it as it boils.

The step that matters

Boil the filling slowly. Cooking the chocolate, sugar and water gently lets the sugar dissolve and the mixture thicken evenly. Boiling too hard can scorch the sugar or chocolate, or make the filling grainy.

“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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