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Dessert

Black Chocolate Cake

A chocolate cake made with sour milk, coffee, and walnuts, topped with a walnut-sugar frosting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Black Chocolate Cake

Why it works: Chocolate and coffee are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,497 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells buttery, creamy. The science ↓

Black 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. 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 batter

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

  2. Dissolve the baking soda in the sour milk.

  3. In a bowl, mix the granulated sugar, grated chocolate, and baking powder.

  4. Add the dissolved baking soda mixture and hot coffee to the dry ingredients.

  5. Beat in the yolks of the eggs and melted butter.

  6. Gradually add the flour and mix until smooth.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into two greased cake pans.

  2. Bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the frosting

  1. For the frosting, combine chopped walnuts and sugar in a bowl.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Chocolate + coffeetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,497 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

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

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

  3. Milk + coffeetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Chocolate + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  5. Coffee + walnuttop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together289 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks add richness, structure and moisture to the batter.
Baking soda
Reacts with the sour milk to produce gas that helps the cake rise.
Baking powder
Provides additional lift so the cake rises as it bakes.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it sets.
Sour milk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and tenderizes the crumb.
Grated chocolate
Adds chocolate flavor and fat, giving the cake a rich, moist texture.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda in the sour milk. Baking soda needs an acid to react and release gas. Dissolving it fully in the sour milk spreads the reaction evenly, so the cake rises without holes or bitter patches.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Hazelnutfits about as well
  3. Cocoafits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, chocolate, coffee, egg, butter, flour. 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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