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Dessert

Potato Caramel Cake

A cake made with butter, sugar, eggs, grated chocolate, mashed potatoes, spices, and nuts, baked at 350°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Potato Caramel 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. Cream together the sugar and butter.

  2. Add the egg yolks and sweet milk, mixing well.

  3. In a separate bowl, combine the hot mashed potatoes and grated chocolate until melted.

  4. Sift together the flour, baking powder, and spices, then add to the mixture.

  5. Fold in the beaten egg whites and chopped nuts.

Bake and assemble

  1. Bake in layers at 350°F (175°C) until done.

  2. Assemble with icing.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Potato + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the crumb.
Eggs
Provide structure and lift when the whites are beaten and folded in.
Hot mashed potatoes
Add moisture and a soft, tender texture to the cake.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake batter.
Baking powder
Releases gas to make the cake rise.
Grated chocolate
Adds flavour and richness, melting into the batter.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air that gives the cake its lift. Overmixing or deflating them during folding makes the layers dense and flat.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, chocolate, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg):

  1. Sweet potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Arrowrootfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, chocolate, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg. 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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