Skip to main content
Dessert

Old Fashioned Layer Cake

A layered cake with molasses and spices, topped with a lemon‑egg white frosting.

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

Why it works: Cinnamon and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,536 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Old Fashioned Layer 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Gradually add the flour and baking powder, alternating with the milk.

  5. Divide the batter into three parts.

  6. To one part, add the molasses and spices, mixing in a little more flour if needed.

  7. Pour the plain batter into two greased cake pans and the spiced batter into one.

Bake and cool

  1. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

  2. Let the cakes cool before frosting.

Frost and assemble

  1. For the frosting, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  2. Gradually add the sugar, lemon zest, and lemon juice, beating until smooth.

  3. Frost the layers, placing the spiced layer in the middle.

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 + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  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
Creamed with sugar to trap air, giving the cake a tender, fine texture and rich flavor.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, helping the batter set and hold its rise in the oven.
All-purpose flour
Forms the cake's main structure once mixed with liquid and heated.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the layers rise as they bake.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep, slightly bittersweet flavor to the spiced layer.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks to form the airy structure of the frosting.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Egg whites hold air only when fully whipped and free of fat; underwhipped or greasy whites will not stiffen, leaving a runny frosting that does not hold its shape.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Allspicethe original

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

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipes