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Dessert

Chocolate Cake

A chocolate cake with a chocolate filling made from sugar, flour, egg, chocolate, and scalded milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 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 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 cake batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cream together the sugar and butter, then add the sweet milk and mix well.

  3. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cream of tartar, and baking soda.

  4. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture.

  5. Beat in the eggs and vanilla extract until smooth.

  6. Divide the batter between two shallow pans and bake until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the filling

  1. For the filling, combine the sugar, flour, and egg in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the grated or melted chocolate and scalded milk.

  3. Cook over medium heat until thickened, stirring constantly.

  4. Remove from heat and add vanilla extract to flavor.

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. Vanilla + chocolatetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  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

All-purpose flour
Provides the starch and structure that hold the cake crumb together as it bakes.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, and help bind the batter as it sets in the oven.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the cake and helps create a tender crumb and gentle browning.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavor, and helps trap air when creamed with sugar.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter so the baking soda reacts and helps the cake rise.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic ingredients to produce gas that leavens the cake.

The step that matters

Cook the filling until thickened. The egg and flour mixture must be stirred constantly over medium heat so the starch swells and the egg cooks evenly without lumping or scrambling. Stopping too early leaves the filling thin.

“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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Filling 18French 14Marbled 13Black 11Dark 10Marble 7 See all 565 →

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