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Dessert

Marble Cake

A cake made by alternating chocolate and vanilla batter swirled together.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. 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.

Prepare

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

Make the two mixtures

  1. In a bowl, cream together ½ lb butter and ¾ lb sugar.

  2. Add 3 egg whites and mix well.

  3. In another bowl, combine 10 oz flour and 1 teaspoon baking powder, then add to the white mixture with enough milk to achieve a proper consistency.

  4. In a separate bowl, cream together ½ lb butter and ¾ lb sugar for the yellow mixture.

  5. Add 1 egg, 3 egg yolks, 10 oz flour, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1 tablespoon cocoa powder, and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, mixing well.

  6. Divide each mixture in half, color half of the white mixture with cochineal, and add cocoa to half of the yellow mixture with a little more milk.

Bake and serve

  1. Grease a cake tin and alternate spoonfuls of the colored mixtures, swirling them together.

  2. Bake for 45 minutes.

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. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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
Creams with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps the creamed butter hold air for a softer texture.
Egg whites
Add moisture and help set the structure of the cake as it bakes.
All-purpose flour
Forms the main structure of the cake as its proteins set during baking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises in the oven.
Cocoa powder
Adds chocolate flavor and darkens the yellow batter to create the contrasting swirl.

The step that matters

Swirling the colored mixtures. Alternate spoonfuls and swirl only lightly. Overmixing blends the two batters into one uniform color, losing the marbled pattern and possibly toughening the crumb by developing too much gluten in the flour.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Hazelnutfits about as well
  3. Cocoafits less well
  4. Chestnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, flour, egg, milk, cocoa powder, vanilla. 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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