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Dessert

Chocolate Layer Cake

A chocolate cake with a chocolate filling between layers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chocolate Layer 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the cake

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

  2. Cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Stir in the sweet milk.

  5. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and baking powder, then gradually add to the wet mixture.

  6. Pour the batter into a greased cake pan and bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Make the filling and assemble

  1. For the filling, dissolve the grated chocolate in a small cup of milk and bring to a boil.

  2. Add ½ cup sugar, a small piece of butter, a little salt, and your choice of flavoring to the chocolate mixture.

  3. Once the cake is cooled, spread the chocolate filling between the layers.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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
Creams with sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, fine crumb.
Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure and richness as they set in the oven.
Flour
Builds the cake's structure as its starches set during baking.
Eagle baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the cake rises and becomes light.
Grated chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavor and body of the filling.

The step that matters

Bringing the chocolate filling to a boil. Chocolate can seize or turn grainy if it overheats or is not fully dissolved in the milk. Dissolving it fully and stirring keeps the filling smooth and glossy before the sugar and butter are added.

“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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