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Dessert

Milk Chocolate Cake

A chocolate cake made with butter, flour, sugar, eggs, sour milk, chocolate, vanilla, baking soda, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Milk Chocolate Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 375°F (190°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and gradually add the sugar.

  2. Add 1 unbeaten egg and beat thoroughly.

  3. Add the second egg and continue beating.

  4. Alternately add the sifted flour and salt with the sour milk mixed with vanilla.

  5. Melt the chocolate over hot water and beat it in thoroughly.

  6. Dissolve the baking soda in the vinegar and add it last.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter into two greased 9-inch pans.

  2. Bake at 375°F (190°C) for 25-30 minutes.

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. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Butter
Creams with the sugar to trap air and give the cake a tender, rich crumb.
Eggs
Add structure and richness, binding the batter as it sets in the oven.
Cake flour
Provides the structure that holds the cake's rise and crumb once baked.
Sour milk or buttermilk
Adds moisture and acidity that tenderises the crumb and activates the baking soda.
Bitter chocolate
Supplies the chocolate flavour and colour that define the cake.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the vinegar and sour milk to produce gas that lifts the batter.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda in vinegar last. The soda and vinegar react immediately to release gas, so the batter should go into the pans and into the oven right away to keep the rise.

“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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