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Dessert

Ice Cream Cake

A layered cake made with egg whites, butter, sugar, milk, flour, baking powder, almond extract, and topped with a boiled sugar icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Ice Cream 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. In a bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff.

  3. In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar together.

  4. Add the milk, flour, baking powder, and almond extract to the butter mixture.

  5. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

  6. Pour the batter into layers and bake until golden.

Make the icing and finish

  1. For the icing, boil the sugar with water until it ropes.

  2. Pour the hot syrup over the beaten egg white and vanilla, then beat well until fluffy.

  3. Spread the icing between the layers and on top of the cake.

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. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

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

  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

Egg whites
Whipped to foam, they lighten the batter and give the cake its rise and airy crumb.
Butter
Creamed with sugar, it traps air and adds richness and a tender texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the cake and, creamed with butter, helps hold air for a fine crumb.
Flour
Provides the structure that sets the cake as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the layers rise in the oven.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stirring vigorously deflates the whipped foam and the cake loses its lift. Fold gently with a wide motion so the air stays trapped in the batter.

“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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