Skip to main content
Dessert

Marble Cake

A layered cake made with alternating white and brown batters, flavored with molasses, cloves, nutmeg, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Marble 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batters

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

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

  3. In another bowl, cream together the white sugar and 1 cup of butter.

  4. Add the sweet milk, flour, cream of tartar, and baking soda to the butter mixture.

  5. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

  6. In a separate bowl, mix the egg yolks with brown sugar and 1 cup of molasses.

  7. Add the sour milk, remaining butter, flour, ground cloves, grated nutmeg, and baking soda to the yolk mixture.

Bake

  1. Grease and flour a cake pan, then alternate layers of the white and brown batter.

  2. Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Egg whites
Beaten to stiff peaks, they lighten the batter and give it an airy, open crumb.
Egg yolks
Add richness and tenderness to the brown batter and help bind it.
Butter
Adds fat for a tender texture and rich flavor.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Stabilizes the whipped egg whites and adds acidity to help the leavening work.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweetness to the brown batter.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air only when whipped to stiff peaks; overmixing or stirring vigorously deflates them, which makes the cake dense instead of light.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, butter, milk, flour, cream, molasses):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter, milk, flour, cream, molasses. 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.

More marble cake recipes

Chocolate 23 See all 221 →

You might also like

Molasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesClove CakeClove Cake53 recipesMolasses Sponge CakeMolasses Sponge Cake9 recipes