Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Sunshine Cake
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Sift and set aside the flour and sugar.
Beat the egg yolks and salt thoroughly.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites with the cream of tartar.
Mix and bake
Stir in the sugar lightly, then add the yolks, and fold in the flour.
Bake in a tube pan at 400°F (200°C) for 35 to 40 minutes.
When done, invert the pan until the cake is cold.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together30,481 recipes
Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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 trap air when beaten, giving the cake its light, airy structure, while yolks add richness.
- Cream of tartar
- Stabilizes the beaten egg whites, helping the foam hold its volume during mixing and baking.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cake and helps stabilize the egg foam, giving a fine, tender crumb.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the airy foam together as the cake sets.
The step that matters
Folding in the flour. Folding gently keeps the air beaten into the egg whites. Stirring or overmixing deflates the foam, leading to a dense, flat cake.
“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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