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Dessert

Prince of Wales Cake

A layered cake with a dark and light batter, containing raisins, spices, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Prince of Wales 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.

Prepare the dark batter

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

  2. In a bowl, mix brown sugar, butter, sour milk, flour, raisins, dissolved baking soda, molasses, egg yolks, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves until well combined.

Make the light batter

  1. In another bowl, combine flour, corn starch, sweet milk, butter, sugar, and baking powder.

  2. Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form and fold into the light mixture.

Bake and finish

  1. Layer the dark and light mixtures in a baking pan.

  2. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

  3. Cool and frost 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. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Raisin + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

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

  4. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the light batter and give it an airy texture.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and molasses to produce gas that helps the dark batter rise.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking to lift the light batter and keep it tender.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and sweetness throughout the dark batter.
Molasses
Adds deep sweetness, moisture and color to the dark batter.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the dark batter.

The step that matters

Folding the whipped egg whites. Egg whites hold air only when whipped to stiff peaks. Folding gently keeps that air in, so the light layer stays airy rather than deflating and becoming 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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