Skip to main content
Dessert

Cream Cake

A light cake made with sugar, flour, eggs, milk, and almond extract, baked in a preheated oven.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Cream Cake

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Mix and bake

  1. In a mixing bowl, combine sugar and flour, rubbing them together.

  2. On a plate, mix baking soda and cream of tartar, breaking up lumps with a spoon.

  3. Make a well in the dry ingredients and add the yolks of the 4 eggs one by one.

  4. Whip the egg whites to stiff peaks on a dry plate, then gently fold into the mixture.

  5. Grease 4 jelly cake tins with butter and evenly distribute the batter.

  6. Bake in the preheated oven for 7 minutes.

Heat milk and beat egg

  1. In a saucepan, heat the milk with salt until boiling.

  2. Beat 1 egg until light, then stir in 1 tablespoon of flour and mix well.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whipped whites trap air for lift, while yolks add richness and structure to the crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake's crumb once baked.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the cake a tender texture.
Baking soda
Releases gas when combined with an acid, helping the cake rise.
Cream of tartar
Acts as an acid that reacts with baking soda and helps stabilise the whipped whites.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the batter.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped egg whites. The whites hold the air that makes the cake light. Stirring or folding roughly deflates them, so fold gently and only until just combined.

“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.

More cream cake recipes

Ice 127Sour 42Almond 41Whipped 36Boston 35French 34 See all 226 →

You might also like

Almond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipesAlmond CustardAlmond Custard22 recipesAlmond WafersAlmond Wafers22 recipesCoconut Almond CakeCoconut Almond Cake17 recipes