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Dessert

Vermicelli Cake

A sweet cake made from vermicelli, milk, sugar, butter, currants, sultanas, lemon rind, mace, salt, and eggs, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Vermicelli 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.

Prepare the custard base

  1. Parboil the vermicelli in water until tender.

  2. Simmer the vermicelli with the milk until well thickened.

  3. Mix in the sugar, butter, currants, sultanas, lemon rind, mace, salt, and egg yolks.

Assemble and bake

  1. Beat the egg whites to a firm froth and gently fold into the mixture.

  2. Butter a square cake pan and sprinkle with bread crumbs.

  3. Pour the mixture into the pan to about 1 inch thick.

  4. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until nicely colored.

Serve

  1. Serve cut into squares with a hot fruit sauce or compote.

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 + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Currant + macetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,791 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Milk + curranttop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Vermicelli
Thickens the milk into a starchy body that gives the cake its structure.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mixture and help it set firm when baked.
Egg whites
Whipped to a froth, they lighten the mixture and help it rise in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps it brown during baking.
Milk
Provides moisture and, when simmered with the vermicelli, a creamy base.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold air that lightens the mixture. Stirring them in vigorously deflates the foam, so fold gently and keep the batter airy for a lighter bake.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, butter, currant, lemon, egg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, butter, currant, lemon, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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