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Dessert

Marble Cake

A layered cake with alternating white and brown batter swirled to create a marbled appearance.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. 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. 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 white batter

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

  2. Beat the whites of 7 eggs in a bowl until stiff peaks form.

  3. Cream together 2 cups of white sugar and 1 cup of softened butter in another bowl.

  4. Add 1 cup of sweet milk, 4 cups of flour, 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar, and 1 teaspoon of baking soda to the creamed mixture.

  5. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

Make the dark batter

  1. Mix the yolks of 7 eggs with 2 cups of brown sugar and 1 cup of molasses in a separate bowl.

  2. Stir in 1 cup of sour milk, 1 cup of softened butter, 5 cups of flour, 2 tablespoons of ground cloves, 1 grated nutmeg, and 1.5 teaspoons of baking soda.

Marble and bake

  1. Layer the white and brown mixtures in a greased cake pan.

  2. Swirl with a knife to create a marbled effect.

  3. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

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

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Eggs
Whites whipped to stiff peaks lighten the batter and give it an airy structure.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it adds richness and a tender crumb.
All-purpose flour
Forms the cake's main structure once it sets in the oven.
Molasses
Adds moisture, dark color, and a deep sweet flavor to the dark batter.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic sour milk and cream of tartar to make the cake rise.

The step that matters

Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Stiff whites hold the air that lightens the batter. Vigorous stirring knocks that air out, leaving a denser, heavier cake.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

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