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Dessert

Mahogany Cake

A chocolate cake made with sweet milk, Baker's chocolate, brown sugar, butter, eggs, sour milk, baking soda, flour, and vanilla extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Mahogany 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. Cook the Baker's chocolate in ½ cup sweet milk until melted; let it cool.

  2. In a bowl, cream together the brown sugar and butter.

  3. Add the egg yolks and mix well.

  4. Stir in the cooled chocolate mixture and sour milk.

  5. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  6. Combine the baking soda with the flour and add to the mixture.

  7. Fold in the beaten egg whites and vanilla extract.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into layers or a loaf pan.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until a toothpick comes out clean.

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs
Egg whites beaten to stiff peaks add lift, and yolks add richness and structure to the crumb.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk to produce gas, helping the cake rise.
All-purpose flour
Provides the starch and gluten that give the cake its main structure.
Baker's chocolate
Adds chocolate flavor and deep color, giving the cake its mahogany tone.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and contributes to a tender, deeply flavored crumb.
Butter
Creamed with sugar to trap air and add fat for tenderness and flavor.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air only when stiff; overmixing or deflating them while folding loses the lift they provide, so the cake bakes up dense.

“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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