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Dessert

Victoria Cakes

A light sponge cake made with butter, flour, sugar, eggs, and jam.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Victoria Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the butter until creamy.

  2. Gradually work in the sugar, flour, and salt while continuing to beat.

  3. Add the eggs, well beaten, and mix thoroughly until smooth and creamy.

  4. Butter a baking tin and pour the mixture into it.

Bake and fill

  1. Bake for about 20 minutes in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C).

  2. Once the cake is cold, spread one half with jam.

  3. Fold the other half over it and press together.

Shape and serve

  1. Cut the cakes into fancy shapes.

  2. Icing half of them white and the other half pink.

  3. Pile on a dish and serve.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Butter
Creamed with sugar, it traps air that helps the cake rise and gives a tender crumb.
Flour
Its proteins set during baking to form the cake's structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, helps hold air for a light texture.
Eggs
Add structure as they set, along with moisture and richness to the batter.
Jam
Adds sweetness and fruity flavour between the cake layers.

The step that matters

Beating the butter and sugar until creamy. Creaming beats air into the fat, and that air expands in the oven to lift the cake. Under-beaten batter bakes dense, while adding the eggs too quickly can curdle 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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