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Dessert

Neapolitan Cake

A multi-layered cake with yellow, pink, white, and brown layers, filled with custard and topped with chocolate and almond flavors.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 24 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Neapolitan Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cake batters

  1. Cream 2 cups powdered sugar with 1 cup butter.

  2. Add 5 eggs (yolks and whites beaten separately), ½ cup milk, 3 cups flour, and a little nutmeg.

  3. Cream ½ pound butter with 1 pound powdered sugar.

  4. Fold in 10 whipped egg whites.

  5. Divide the batter in half.

  6. Color one half with a little cochineal.

  7. Cream ¼ cup butter with 1 cup powdered sugar.

  8. Add 3 lightly beaten eggs, 2 tablespoons cream, 1 heaping cup flour, and 2 tablespoons grated chocolate.

  9. Bake in layers, making three of each color.

Make the custard

  1. Heat 2 cups milk to boiling.

  2. Stir in 2 tablespoons cornstarch mixed with milk and 2 cups powdered sugar.

  3. Cook for a few minutes, then add 2 eggs and boil until thick.

Flavor and assemble

  1. Divide the custard.

  2. Stir 2 tablespoons grated chocolate into one half.

  3. Stir 1 teaspoon bitter almond into the other.

  4. Whip 3 egg whites with 1 heaping cup powdered sugar.

  5. Add the juice and half the grated peel of 1 lemon.

  6. Use a layer of brown cake as a base.

  7. Spread with yellow filling.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

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

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

  4. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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
Provide structure and lift in the cake, and thicken the custard when heated.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender crumb to the cake batters.
All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the cake layers as the batter sets in the oven.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk custard so it can hold its shape between layers.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batters and custard and gives a fine, smooth texture.
Cochineal
Gives one batter its pink color for the layered effect.

The step that matters

Boil the custard until thick. Cornstarch granules swell and thicken only when the mixture reaches a boil, so stopping early leaves the custard thin and runny.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits less well
  4. Peppermintfits less well

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