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Dessert

A Swiss Cake

A rich cake made with flour, butter, sugar, cream, eggs, rum, and grated Parmesan cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

A Swiss Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Set a sponge with 1½ pounds of sifted flour until well risen.

  2. Mix in 1½ pounds of sifted flour, 2 pounds of fresh butter, 1 ounce of salt, 4 ounces of sifted sugar, ½ cup of cream, the yolks of 24 eggs, 12 egg whites, ⅓ cup of rum, and 6 ounces of grated Parmesan cheese.

  3. Set the mixture in a warm place for 1 hour.

Bake

  1. Bake in a hoop for 1½ hours.

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

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

  2. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + rumtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,007 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Forms the structure that holds the cake together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and a rich texture.
Egg yolks
Add richness and emulsify the fat for a smooth, tender crumb.
Egg whites
Trap air and help the cake rise and set in the oven.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury flavour and some saltiness to the crumb.

The step that matters

Let the mixture rise in a warm place. The sponge needs time in a warm spot for yeast or air to lift the dough before baking. Under-proofing leaves a dense cake, while over-proofing can collapse it.

“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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